EDITOR’S NOTE: This story is featured in the Fall 2025 edition of The Tartan magazine. Read more from The Tartan at alma.edu/tartan.

When Ellen Loudon Edgar ’66 thinks about the time she spent at Alma College, she remembers salamanders.

“I was a biology major, and for my senior project, I collected salamanders out at the Bog,” Edgar said, referring to the informal nickname of the Alma College Ecological Station.

“My friend and I would drive out there in this beat-up old car the biology department had. We called it the ‘Blue Newt’ — N-E-W-T, like the amphibian, not the bomb.”

More than 50 years later, Edgar is still thinking about salamanders — and wildflowers, and creative writing students, and the winding dirt road out to the Bog. That’s what led her to fund a new field van for the Alma College Biology Department, replacing one that was more than 25 years old.

Associate Professor of Biology and department chair Brian Doyle said the inspiration for the vehicle didn’t start with alumni or advancement — rather, it came from students.

“Last year, during our senior dinner, I started asking graduating students what some of their most memorable experiences were,” Doyle said. “One of the things that really stood out was that classes they took at the Bog were some of the most impactful. They really enjoyed the opportunity to get into the muck and be outdoors — getting their boots dirty, doing real biology.”

That feedback spurred the department to begin bringing introductory students to the Bog, something that hadn’t happened in decades. But with larger class sizes, existing transportation options quickly proved insufficient. Edgar’s gift directly responded to that challenge. The new van allows faculty to take more students to the Bog at once and opens up possibilities for longer-range trips to locations like zoos, aquariums, and even field sites in other states.

Edgar’s career after Alma spanned microbiology, public school teaching, and ultimately income tax preparation in the upstate New York, where she now lives in retirement. Her journey is emblematic of what she believes a liberal arts education should provide: the freedom and preparation to do anything.

“When you graduate from a liberal arts school like Alma, you can do anything,” Edgar said. “That’s the point.

“When I donated the van, I wasn’t doing it for recognition,” she continued. “I want more people out there (at the Bog). I want students to be able to go someplace quiet, close by, that lets them think beyond themselves. Not just biologists — creative writers, poets, anyone.”

It’s a gift that came full circle last November, when she returned to the Bog with professors, staff, and her sister.

“I saw it in a whole new light,” she said. “Back then, it was just a bunch of logs and salamanders. Now it’s a place of connection — and that’s what we need most.”