03/13/25

By: FHSU Foundation
HAYS, Kan. – Roxy (Green) Tate, a 1972 Fort Hays State graduate, recently made a significant gift to the university that will keep her family’s name alive. Last year, she sold her family’s 160-acre homestead near Osborne. The property included the original limestone house where she spent her childhood.

As an only child, saying goodbye to the land that had been in her mother’s family since the 1880s was bittersweet for Roxy. By creating a nursing scholarship at FHSU with the sale of the land, she will give back to rural Kansas and honor her family’s legacy.

Roxy says the scholarship encompasses her family of homesteaders and their heritage. Her grandfather, Nicholas Bergsma, came to the United States from Holland in the 1870s, landing in New York and eventually making his way to Kansas.

By 1886, he and his brother, Jacob, had each “proved up” their own 160-acre homestead. Jacob never married, but Nicholas and his wife, Emma, had 12 children; Roxy’s mother, Minnie, was the youngest.

Emma was widowed in 1914 at the age of 44 but managed to keep the homestead through World Wars I and II, as well as the Great Depression. Emma retained ownership until she died in 1956. After World War II, Roxy’s parents, Bill and Minnie Green, took over the daily farming tasks. Minnie passed away in 1979, and Bill continued farming into his late 70s with the help of his stepson.

Roxy came to Fort Hays State University to study sociology and journalism. As part of her journalism coursework, she worked two years on the annually published Reveille yearbook, serving one of those as editor, and two years on the weekly campus newspaper.

Roxy wanted to leave something lasting behind to honor her parents. With some of the sales proceeds, Roxy established the William and Minnie (Bergsma) Green Nursing Scholarship at FHSU to ensure her family’s legacy will live on in perpetuity through the work of future Kansas nurses.

Many nursing students remain in Western Kansas after graduating from Fort Hays State, and Roxy is very pleased that the family scholarship will focus on nursing and strengthening the healthcare resources in rural Kansas.

“Kansas is a homestead state, and this is largely forgotten,” Roxy said, “It was important for me to ensure that the Bergsma name is remembered as a part of that history and that my father is also honored. Dad was so proud to be a farmer and stockman.”

Join Roxy in making a difference at Fort Hays State University. Give back in honor of friends, family, loved ones, or a business, and support the area of campus that means the most to you. Among other options available, you can give the gift of land, stock, property, or grain. To learn more about how you can start a scholarship or make a gift to FHSU, visit foundation.fhsu.edu, email foundation@fhsu.edu, or call 785-628-5620.