Shattuck Natives Fund, Receive OSU Scholarship

Wednesday, November 9, 2016

Logan Holt is exactly the type of student the Vincent family envisioned helping through the Don and Emily Vincent Endowed Scholarship at Oklahoma State University.

Holt is this year’s recipient of the $1,500 scholarship for incoming freshmen from Shattuck High School. She is studying agricultural education in the College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, and plans to become an ag teacher like her father and maternal grandfather.

“I want to thank the Vincent family for this scholarship,” Holt said. “It was an honor to be chosen as a recipient. Their generosity allows me to continue working toward my passion. I look forward to this chapter and what the future holds for me.”

Holt has been a member of the National FFA Organization (formerly Future Farmers of America) since she was in eighth grade, and says she has been around it her whole life. The family raises Berskshire pigs and sells them through their business, L&K Berks.

“My dad has had me showing pigs since I was 3,” Holt said. “I also showed cattle. I did public speaking. I was a chapter officer. I’ve been to leadership conferences.”

Holt is the oldest of Barclay and Camille Holt’s three children. The couple met at, and graduated from, OSU. Barclay majored in agricultural education and taught ag in the Oklahoma towns of Freedom and Chattanooga. He is now assistant superintendent for full-time programs at High Plains Technology Center, the Woodward-based campus in the Oklahoma CareerTech system.

Camille studied secondary education and is now the principal at Shattuck Elementary School. Camille’s father, Dale DeWitt, was also an OSU agricultural education graduate who went on to teach ag before serving in the Oklahoma State Legislature and being inducted into the CareerTech Hall of Fame.

Clearly Logan Holt’s family background is as steeped in education as it is in agriculture.

“I have always wanted to be a teacher, and as I got older, agriculture became my passion, so I put them together,” Holt said. “I have had some really good ag teachers. I’ve had some that have been able to involve everybody and take the kids that didn’t want to go to school or really try on their grades, and give them something to work for and actually go to school. So I want to be able to do that with this degree, and do that for somebody else.”

Shattuck High alumni Mike, Mark and Brad Vincent established this scholarship in honor of their parents, Don and Emily Vincent. The OSU alumni were approaching their 52nd wedding anniversary when Emily passed away in 2006.

“Both sides of our family were very big on education and both sides were in rural areas,” Brad Vincent said. “They brought us up to believe in the value of education. We want our parents’ legacy to live on.”

Don Vincent and Emily Victor met at Oklahoma A&M College as freshmen in the 1950s when an alphabetical seating arrangement put them next to each other for a class in OSU’s original building, Old Central. They married in 1954, shortly after Emily completed a secondary education degree. Don earned a business and public administration degree in 1955.

Don then transitioned from the ROTC to active duty in the Air Force. The couple lived in Fort Worth, Texas, for two years before moving to Levelland, Texas, for several months. After a brief stop in Oklahoma City, they settled near the panhandle in Shattuck in January 1961, where they operated and eventually owned Vincent Motor Company. They later sold the dealership, which is now known as Jess Wales Chevrolet.

Don spent 40 years in the automobile business, while Emily devoted 23 years to making a home for her husband and three sons. She then updated her degree and taught fourth grade in Shattuck for 20 years.

All three of their sons earned college degrees, with Mark and Brad joining their parents as OSU alumni.

“This scholarship is intended to be a continuation of the commitment to education instilled in us not just by our parents, but by our grandparents as well,” Brad Vincent said.

Each applicant must have at least a 2.5 high-school GPA and be enrolled full-time at OSU. If there are no eligible recipients from Shattuck, students from elsewhere in Ellis County will be given consideration.

Additional gifts to this fund will increase the annual scholarship production, creating more or larger awards. Those interested in contributing can visit OSUgiving.com/vincent or contact Glenn Zannotti at (918) 954-8438 or gzannotti@OSUgiving.com.

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