Staggs family endows first named scholarship for pharmacy students
Chris Pepple |
The first named scholarship for Lipscomb’s College of Pharmacy students has been created, Roger Davis, dean for the College of Pharmacy at Lipscomb University, recently announced. Bill and Judy Staggs have established an endowed scholarship to be named The Staggs Family Pharmacy Scholarship.
“The Staggs family has been a significant force in the Tennessee pharmacy circle for at least 60 years. There is a long family association with Lipscomb also, with many family members attending David Lipscomb Campus School and Lipscomb University. The decision among the Staggs family members to honor Betty and Bill Staggs, Sr., with an endowed scholarship fund expresses their desire to create an ongoing tribute to the dedication of both parents to the pharmacy field and expresses confidence in our new College of Pharmacy,” said Davis.
Bill and Betty Staggs met in the University of Tennessee’s pharmacy school in Memphis just after World War II. Bill Staggs, originally from Portland, Tenn., had returned home from the war as a highly decorated Air Force captain. He flew a P-51D Mustang which he named Wild Honey. He flew 56 missions totaling 279 combat hours from late 1944 until the end of the war. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Air Medal with Oak Leaf Clusters. He was also honored by the United States House of Representatives for his valiant service.
Betty Staggs grew up in the Dunlap-Pikeville, Tenn., area in East Tennessee. When she and Bill married after their graduation from pharmacy school, they moved back to her hometown where they built and operated their own drug store. During their years as Dunlap pharmacists, they also raised five children: Bill, Jr., and Henry, practicing pharmacists; Steve, a Nashville physician; Penny (Tenpenny), a Nashville realtor; and Jim, an entrepreneur who preceded his father in death.
When the younger Bill Staggs reached adolescence, his parents sent him to live with family in Nashville so he could attend David Lipscomb High School. Eventually, the entire family moved to Nashville so the children could attend Lipscomb. Later, the elder Bill and Betty Staggs returned to Dunlap where they continued to work in pharmacy as well as operate a large farm in the area before their deaths.
“Pharmacy has been very meaningful to all of us. We now have the third generation of practicing pharmacists in our family. We hope that the scholarship at Lipscomb University enables others to have fulfilling careers in this field,” said Bill Staggs, Jr., a classmate with Davis at the University of Tennessee College of Pharmacy. Staggs has been very active with mission work. He has traveled the globe with Lipscomb faculty as they serve others together, often securing medications for medical mission teams. He led the efforts to create the endowed scholarship fund as a memorial to both of his parents and a tribute to his family ties to this community and this university.
"My parents loved what they did, and they felt that pharmacy was a way to give back to the small community in which they lived. They truly gave all when it came to serving their neighbor. They never hesitated to go out late at night and open up the drug store to get medicine that was needed for a sick child. In turn, the community loved and supported Staggs Pharmacy. Dad's laugh was known through out the valley of Sequatchie County. Everyone wanted to come in and have a cup of coffee and hear him tell his long tales. When he moved to Nashville, he continued his love for storytelling while he served his community at Green Hills Pharmacy. My parents love for Lipscomb was seen in sending their five children through high school and college and encouraging each one of us to follow our dream, hoping it would be pharmacy. We are thankful that their dream of supporting the pharmacy field will continue through this scholarship at Lipscomb University," said Penny Tenpenny.