Creighton University announces $10M gift to support student scholarships 

OMAHA — Creighton University has announced a $10 million scholarship gift that can be used to financially support a variety of students regardless of study discipline or program area. 

A media statement this week from Creighton officials described the gift as one of the largest ever made to support “unrestricted” scholarships not limited to a particular field or income level.

The funds come from the estates of alumnus Dr. Elno Zikmund and his wife, Tillie. He died in 2022 and she passed away the next year.

They expand the Elno T. and Mathilda M. Zikmund Endowed Scholarship, which was created in 2010. Its 80 recipients so far represent a variety of professions, ranging from budding physicians to accountants and ministers. 

“With the wide-ranging support of the Zikmund Scholarship, students from many different fields are taking Creighton’s values into their communities, as Dr. Zikmund did,” said the Rev. Daniel Hendrickson, president of Creighton. 

The family’s gift continues a university legacy that started nearly 90 years ago when Elno Zikmund’s mother, Omaha nurse Hattie Zikmund, paid for her son’s Creighton education, the statement said. Though Zikmund went on to acquire his medical degree elsewhere, he attributed his formation as a person and success as a physician to his time at Creighton.

After serving in the U.S. Navy during World War II, Zikmund practiced medicine in Central City. He retired there at age 65 and moved to Omaha. Zikmund and his first wife, Janaan Zikmund, who died in 1962, had four sons.

Admirers noted a framed copy of Zikmund’s favorite poem, “Desiderata” by Max Ehrmann, that hung in his medical office. They said he lived by the words, among them: 

“Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story.”