As a child, Diane Adams Whitmarsh ’72 would visit her grandma in Springfield and play on the swings at Greenwood Laboratory School.

She peeked in the windows of the school and told her mom she wanted to go there some day. Her mother said she could — for college.

As Whitmarsh grew, she still wanted to be a Bear.

She enrolled at what was then called Southwest Missouri State University to pursue a degree in education: “They had such a great reputation.”

Her grandmother was a Bear in the 1910s; they both went into education

Whitmarsh was inspired by her grandmother Jessie Montgomery Hammar, who received her teaching certificate in 1912 from the Normal School.

Whitmarsh spent 38 years in education, and gave back what she could to her alma mater. When Whitmarsh neared 73, she had to take required minimum distributions, called RMDs, from her annuities. She realized this was a path to make a bigger difference through a scholarship.

She established the Jessie Montgomery Hammar Scholarship in honor of her grandmother. The scholarship is earmarked for juniors or seniors in the College of Education.

“I went to school on grants and scholarships, and I worked,” Whitmarsh said. “My senior year, when I had to do my student teaching, was the hardest time to work because student teaching was a full-time job. This will provide financial support for someone who is in that situation. I don’t know if people realize they can use RMD to fund a scholarship or to just make a one-time donation.”

From one-room schoolhouse to flipping a future fraternity house

Hammar had a sense of adventure and liked to travel, a trait passed to her granddaughter.

She grew up in Hermitage, Missouri, and came to Springfield to earn a teaching certificate.

After graduating, Hammar made the trek to Idaho to teach in a one-room schoolhouse. She lived with a family in town, and part of her pay was a horse she could ride to school. It was a long ride. In winter, she had to arrive in the dark to start a fire to heat the school. Her students ranged in age from 6 to 16.

Hammar met her future husband in Idaho. Sometime after they married, they moved to Springfield. They lived near campus and were house flippers before that was a thing. That’s one reason Whitmarsh was around campus on summer visits: Her grandparents owned what is now the Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity house.

Hammar was a pillar in her community and her church. She volunteered at what is now Cox North hospital and was honored for 3,000 hours of service. She was also a nurturing grandma.

“She encouraged me to do well in school and reach for my dream of being a teacher,” Whitmarsh said. “I remember her telling me, ‘Don’t give it up. You’re just like me; you’re going to push forward. You’re going to be a career woman.’”

Third-generation Bear said teaching is simply in her blood

Whitmarsh’s dad was a pilot, commercial and military, so she moved around as a child. The family settled in Florida.

Whitmarsh was the third generation of her family to be a student at MSU, but the only one with a degree. Her mother also attended with dreams of teaching, but her education was interrupted by World War II.

Whitmarsh taught elementary and junior high, then special education. The Texas resident went into diagnostic testing from early childhood to high school.

She was department head for special education services for a district near Houston, Texas, for 10 years, then did supervising and contract work while teaching at Houston Christian University. She shepherded undergraduates going into special education and graduate students training in diagnostic testing.

Now retired, she teaches art and photography at a senior center, saying it is just in her blood.

Students appreciate the scholarship; grandma would be humbled

Whitmarsh said helping the next generation of teachers graduating from Missouri State is a good feeling.

She has talked to some of the scholarship recipients and they have been so appreciative.

“Almost every one of them say, ‘This was a lifesaver for me in terms of having enough money to not worry while I was trying to student-teach,’” she said.

Hammar passed away when Whitmarsh was a freshman in college.

But if grandma learned a scholarship was established in her honor more than 100 years after she obtained her certificate, this is what she’d feel: “First, she’d be embarrassed because she wasn’t
necessarily one who wanted to be out there. She was more behind the scenes,” said Whitmarsh.

“But I think she would be very happy that I was able to do this in her name.”