Earlier this year, Elizabeth “Liz” Charleton Cole ’70 made an important purchase.
“I bought what I hope is my last car ever,” she said.
For Cole, a retired educator-turned-philanthropist who has funded multiple scholarships at Longwood, her options were many. Luxury vehicles that are essentially mini-resorts on wheels. Self-driving cars equipped with groundbreaking technology. Even flashy, contoured sports cars with engines fit for a track.
So what did Cole, in search of her self-declared “last car ever,” choose for cruising around her home of Salem, Virginia?
“It’s a Subaru,” she said. “It has lumbar support, which helps my back.”
That modest, practical choice of vehicle is the latest sensible financial choice Cole has made in a life full of them. And in choosing frugality, she says, she has more room for another virtue her parents instilled in her at a young age: generosity.
-640x833.jpg)
Growing up in a middle-class home, Cole saw her parents model frugality and generosity as compatible values. Both her father, Cmdr. Basil Junior “Jim” Charleton, and her mother, Elizabeth Charleton, raised her to appreciate the value of a dollar while also understanding the profound impact she could have by uplifting others around her. It’s those virtues that led her to Longwood, which enabled her to achieve her childhood dream of becoming an educator; to Salem, where she spent the majority of her decades-long career as a teacher and reading specialist; and, in retirement, back to Longwood where her philanthropy has impacted the lives of countless students.
Now, in an extension of a philanthropic career that has endowed four Longwood scholarships over the past decade, Cole has established a new endowed professorship at the university to honor her parents and the values they instilled.
Cole’s gift will seed the Cmdr. B.J. (Jim) and Elizabeth Gerko Charleton Endowed Professor of Business, which will annually fund the academic work of a Longwood faculty member in the College of Business and Economics (CBE). The professorship, named in honor of her parents, is part of a university-wide endowed professorship initiative that raised millions in donations from 10 donors during the 2026 fiscal year, including a matching gift from Joan Perry Brock ’64.
Cole chose Longwood’s award-winning business program for her professorship in honor of her father, a Navy pilot who made it a personal mission to model financial literacy for Cole and her two siblings. Charleton enlisted in the Navy in 1942, served in World War II and, upon conclusion of the war, set out to achieve his goal “to become a millionaire by the time he died.”
“My dad invested his money wisely,” Cole said. “When we moved to Norfolk, he came down by himself and picked out a house that he ended up keeping from 1959 to 2015. That enabled him to invest money instead of putting it into another house.”
Her father’s investments eventually provided an inheritance that Cole has used to fuel her philanthropic efforts. But along with that wealth, Cole’s parents also left her something more valuable: a model for how to steward it responsibly and in service to others.
“I’m really thankful I had two really good parents who valued their money and their time,” she said. “They knew what was important. My dad taught us the value of a dollar, and they both instilled in us, especially my mother, the importance of doing for other people.”
Cole has exemplified those values in her philanthropy to her alma mater, beginning in 2016 with the Faye Charleton Hopkins Memorial Scholarship she endowed in honor of her late twin sister. She followed by establishing three more—the Djorko-Charleton Family Scholarship (2020) in honor of her parents, using the original Eastern European spelling of her mother’s maiden name; the Dr. Richard L. Heinemann Scholarship (2021) in honor of a faculty member from her time as a student; and the Elaine Perry Woodard ’71 Athletics Scholarship (2024) in honor of her college roommate.
Each of those scholarships honors influential people in Cole’s life, and all support students with varying campus involvements, personal backgrounds and academic interests. The endowed professorship, meanwhile, will open opportunities for faculty to pursue scholarly research and publication, thereby enhancing Longwood’s contributions to the greater academic discourse.
“The only reason I can do this is because of dad’s money,” Cole said. “I wouldn’t be able to do it on my teacher’s retirement, but I decided I wanted to use his money wisely. My dad always valued education, so I figured the best way to honor him and what my parents taught me was to create opportunities for others.”
Through that lens, Cole says her philanthropic contributions to the university aren’t donations—they’re investments in others. And when it comes to her investments, the returns Cole’s generosity has yielded far outweigh those of a luxury vehicle.
Besides, she’s quite happy with her Subaru, anyway.