The Puterbaugh Foundation of McAlester has established the J.G. Puterbaugh Scholar Fund through a substantial gift to the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation’s (OMRF) endowment. The Puterbaugh Scholar will be selected from each class of Sir Alexander Fleming Scholars each summer. The Fleming Scholar program consists of a dozen students ranging from high school juniors to college juniors. The students are assigned to scientists and perform specific, hands-on research in OMRF laboratories. The Puterbaugh Scholar will be among this group of gifted science students from across Oklahoma.
“Both the researchers at OMRF and the future scientist participating in the Fleming Scholar program will benefit significantly from the Puterbaugh Foundation’s generous gift,” said OMRF President J. Donald Capra, M.D. “OMRF has enjoyed a long-standing relationship with the Puterbaugh family and Foundation and we will ensure that a new generation of future scientists will benefit from the Puterbaugh’s generosity as well.”
The Puterbaugh Scholar Fund is named in honor of J.G. Puterbaugh, who helped found OMRF and served as chairman of the board and president from 1947 – 1950. Mr. Puterbaugh’s niece, the late Allece Garrard of McAlester, provided gifts and artwork to OMRF. An endowed lectureship continues in honor of her husband, OMRF Life Director Tom Garrard, who died in 1984. The Puterbaugh Foundation has helped support OMRF since 1976.
Chartered in 1946, OMRF is a private, non-profit biomedical research institution, which employs over 400 scientists, physicians, technicians, and administrative and support personnel, including Oklahoma’s only two Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigators. OMRF focuses on several critical areas of research: Cancer, heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases, lupus and other autoimmune diseases, stroke, AIDS, children’s diseases, and genetic disorders.
