John and Ginna Walker

Going Above and Beyond to Be Helpful

Ginna and John Walker

John Walker grew up poor on a rural Alabama farm. He wasn’t allowed to go to school until the fifth grade, although he’d been driving tractors and working the farm for years by then. Understandably, he struggled in school. He never dreamed he would attend college anywhere—much less at the University of Wyoming—but now at age 92, he and his wife Ginna look back on long successful years as hard-working educators and generous philanthropists.

John’s senior year of high school as he sat in study hall, the teacher asked him, “John, how would you like to go to college?” He was stunned. Turns out, this teacher’s son was assistant football coach at UW. He put John through the paces and offered him a full scholarship to UW on the spot.

“I couldn’t believe it,” John says. “I just couldn’t believe it.” After a pause, he adds, “It’s the best thing that ever happened to me. It made me.”

That gamble paid off for UW in so many ways. John was part of the 1956 UW Athletics Hall of Fame football team that went undefeated, finishing the season sixteenth in the nation with an invitation to the Sun Bowl.

Going above and beyond to be helpful is a hallmark of both John and Ginna and of their careers. John earned a bachelor’s and then a master’s from UW in physical education teaching, and along the way he served UW cleaning the football stadium of snow, making $35 a month. After managing the Saratoga Inn Golf Course during the summers, John worked at UW as UW Recreation bus driver, a physical education instructor, track coach, on the faculty senate, and many other roles. In 1987, John received the Hollan Award for off-campus teaching, and in 2016, he received College of Health Sciences Distinguished Alumni Award.

John retired in 1995 after 33 years at UW, his final position as an assistant professor. Ginna was three years away from retirement herself, but she retired as well. As with everything, they took the leap together.

During his time at UW, John taught continuing education classes to teachers from across the state. That’s where he and Ginna met—he was teaching an outdoor education class for teachers in Cheyenne, and a friend of Ginna’s convinced her to take it. Ginna had grown up in Texas, earned her teaching degree at Baylor, and was teaching elementary school in Cheyenne.

The rest is history. John helped Ginna get over her fear of heights, and they fell in love on the racquetball court, marrying in 1983. Forty-two years later, they remain “quite a team,” Ginna says. “We work together so well,” John adds. They both have smiles in their voices.

John is so grateful for the education and opportunities that UW has given him, and so he and Ginna decided to give back to UW and to pay it forward. Their first major gift was 58 acres of land near their home between Laramie and Cheyenne, which became the foundation for the John Walker Scholarship in Physical Education Teaching in Kinesiology and Health Promotion. The scholarship specifically supports students training to be physical education teachers. They have also supported the Department of Kinesiology and Health and the Cowboy Joe Club.

“We struggled for so many years and I didn’t know how we were going to pay the grocery bill,” John says. “Now we have enough money to give to help students.” He adds that the thank you letters that they receive from students mean the world to them.

And they keep adding to this scholarship fund. Just as they established their scholarship with real estate, they are significantly enlarging it by donating their beautiful cabin near Encampment. They had originally considered including it as a gift in John’s estate, but then they decided they wanted to see the impact during their lifetimes.

John and Ginna have built a rich and full life together and enriched all those around them—not least of all the University of Wyoming. “The university has never been better to anybody than it has been to me,” John says. “It saved my life.”

Consider supporting UW by making a gift of an asset. Contact Brett Befus at (307) 766-4259 or bbefus@uwyo.edu to discuss options.

What’s your Wyoming Legacy?

John and Ginna Walker donated the above cabin, located near Encampment.