Elon University recently received two estate gifts totaling more than $1.3 million.

The gifts were given from the estates of Margaret (Peggy) Leister ’67 of Towson, Maryland and Muir William Grant and his wife, Lorraine Fogleman Grant of Burlington, North Carolina.

The Leister endowment of more than $800,000 will give scholarship aid for students with disabilities and the Fogleman Grant endowment will support students studying music.

The two estate gifts come a day after the announcement that Dwight and Martha Schar P’16 and P’19 pledged $12 million to Elon – $8 million towards the expansion of the School of Communications and $4 million to a new multipurpose building that will serve as a place for campus speakers, convocation and athletic events.

The Leister endowment

Leister supported Elon for many years with annual contributions to The Educational Opportunities Fund for Students with Disabilities before she passed away in 2013. The recent estate gift from Leister increases the scholarship funds available for students who require special assistance and provides learning resources and equipment to help their studies.

Born with spina bifida and scoliosis, Leister worked for many years with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in Washington, D.C. Her experience as an Elon student with disabilities inspired Leister to create the endowment, the first of its kind at Elon.

The Fogleman Grant endowment                        

The Lorraine Fogleman Grant and Muir William Grant Odyssey Scholarship was created with the couple’s planned gift in connection with their estate. The donation is classified as an Odyssey scholarship, which is created with an endowment gift of $500,000 or more.

The endowment will add to the Lorraine Fogleman Grant and Muir William Grant Music Scholarship, which was established by the couple in 1995 to benefit students studying in music, music performance or music education.

"Peggy Leister and Bill and Lorraine Grant demonstrated great vision in planning their estates to further the passions of their lives," Elon President Leo M. Lambert said in a statement. "These planned gifts will make possible a transformative college experience for generations of deserving young men and women. The proceeds of these estates are a permanent and powerful testament to the lives and legacies of these individuals"