05/08/2007

Gifts Honor Former Auburn First Ladies

Family members of Ann Martin and Cratus Bailey have honored the two former Auburn University first ladies by establishing in their names scholarships that will help deserving horticulture majors pay their way through Auburn.

As part of the AU Campus Club’s First Ladies’ Award Program, James E. Martin, who served as AU president from 1984 to 1992, has given $25,000 to the “It Begins at Auburn” fundraising campaign to create the Ann Freeman Martin Award.

Likewise, the children of the late Wilford S. Bailey have paid tribute to their mother by establishing the Cratus Hester Bailey scholarship. Bailey led the university from 1983 to 1984.

Under the First Ladies’ program, the Campus Club annually presents scholarships in the names of wives of Auburn’s past presidents in the amount of $1000. For the current school year, six horticulture students received First Ladies scholarships. The Martin and Bailey gifts, along with another gift of $25,000 the Campus Club has just contributed to the endowment, will bring the number of First Ladies’ awards to be handed out for the 2007-08 school year to nine.

The bulk of the club’s donation was raised through the organization’s annual spring plant sale.

Former AU President Martin said he made the decision to honor his wife with a scholarship gift when Department of Horticulture and Campus Club representatives informed him of the First Ladies Award program.

“Ann and I are always interested in scholarship programs, because we firmly believe a good university should be able to recruit outstanding academic students just like it does good athletes,” Martin said.

Martin’s scholarship legacy at Auburn was the establishment of the university’s collegiate vanity license plate program. To date, that program has generated $19 million for general AU achievement scholarships to in-state residents.

The Martins met at Auburn in the 1950s when he played basketball and she was a cheerleader. He earned his bachelor’s degree in ag administration in 1954, she a home economics degree in 1957. Now married for 48 years, the Martins live in Morgan County.

Martin was preceded in office at Auburn by Bailey, an AU veterinary professor whom the Board of Trustees in 1983 named interim president while a committee conducted a search for a new president. Before he left the post in 1984, the board officially named Bailey the school’s 13th president in recognition of his outstanding service.

“He didn’t ask for the job, but he did a good job, as was true with everything he did,” a spry Mrs. Bailey said recently.

The couple met at church during her one quarter at what was then Alabama Polytechnic Institute. She went on to earn her degrees in home economics from Nashville’s David Lipscomb and Peabody colleges.

At the time of Bailey’s death in 2000, the couple had been married 58 years. Mrs. Bailey lives in Auburn.

Making the $25,000 donation to establish the Cratus Hester Bailey Award were the Baileys’ four children: Ed Bailey of Rye, N.Y.; Joe Bailey of Auburn; Margaret Bailey Newcomb of Palmyra, Va.; and Sarah Bailey of Acworth, Ga.

With these three latest contributions, the Campus Club First Ladies’ Endowed Scholarship fund, established in 2001, now stands at $175,500. The Campus Club’s goal is to bring the endowment to $500,000, a level at which scholarships could be awarded in the names of each of Auburn’s past, current and future first ladies.

For information on contributing to the endowment, contact Mark Wilton in the College of Agriculture at 334-844-1198 or wiltomt@auburn.edu.

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