This scholarship was established by Hortense Hogue Bell Butler and her son, Dr. David P. Bell, in honor of Hortense's Hogue ancestry. The endowment provides general scholarship assistance to students of West Virginia University at Parkersburg who are residents of Ritchie County and maintain a minimum 3.0 grade point average.  

Hortense, an original WVU Parkersburg “pioneer”,  was one of a small group of Wood County citizens who worked to help first establish WVU Parkersburg on Emerson Avenue in a grade school basement and then at its current campus on Staunton Avenue.