Virginia White

Virginia Kathleen (Salzkorn) White, age 80 of Hastings, Nebraska, passed away at her home on Friday, January 18, 2013, surrounded by her loving sons and daughter.

Private family memorial services will be held at Livingston Butler Volland Funeral Home with Rev. Dr. Lee R. Wigert officiating. Burial will be at Parkview Cemetery in Hastings. There will be no visitation. Book signing will be Friday, January 25, 2013; 9:00 A.M. - 5:00 P.M., and Saturday, January 26, 2013; 9:00 A.M. - 5:00 P.M. at the funeral home. Memorials may be given to the family for a memorial to be established at a later date.

Virginia K. Salzkorn was born on December 8, 1932, to Leroy Dewey & Selma Louise (Meyer) Salzkorn in Gaza, Iowa. She did have one sister, Marilyn J. Salzkorn born in 1937, but died at an early age. Her mother passed at a very young age as well.

She attended a public school where she was the only student in her class for eight years of school, even though there were other students in the school. Her school was about a mile from her home and she often walked to school.

While a youngster, Virginia was encouraged to play the piano. When she was about four years of age, she began piano lessons and was encouraged to practice a great deal of the time. She also developed skills so that she was asked to participate in many piano recitals. She was encouraged by this and did very well. After grade school she was encouraged in high school to take lessons on various instruments. She took lessons on Baritones and Trombones. She developed very good skills in this area and was taken to many radio stations, such as WHO in Des Moines Iowa for concerts and also participated in many dance orchestras and other activities. She also made quite a few records as well as played on various radio stations. She was involved in marching bands both in high school and in college.

She attended Morningside College pre-med program, 1951-1952. This was very difficult as it was mostly a male dominated class. Finally after one year there, she attended the nursing program at St. Luke's Medical Center, graduating with a nursing degree in 1955. She also had a problem there with her allergy to soaps and then the nursing program transferred her for her requirements for the surgery program to a neurology program; under the supervision of two doctors where she completed her course of study. This spurred her interest in the brain and neurology. She was also one of the few students who were asked to participate in public health nursing while in training.

After graduation, she developed an interest in public health nursing and worked in Sioux City for some time with the American Indian population. After that she became interested in mental health issues and worked for a number of years as a mental health nurse.

Shortly after her graduation from nursing school she married her husband Dale "Skip" White on November 4, 1955. They lived in Hastings for many years. She was then employed for seventeen years at the Hastings Regional Center as night nursing supervisor and then also became the director of nursing education where she taught nurses from several states in the mental health field.

While interested in mental health issues, Virginia became interested in learning more about sociology/psychology and attended Hastings College, receiving a B.A. degree in sociology in 1958. She eventually earned a Master's of Science degree in Education, degree in Counseling/Educational Psychology in 1971. She later received a degree as an Educational Specialist from Kearney State College in 1976. She continued to study more about mental health issues her entire life.

While Virginia was studying for her Master's Degree, she worked for Mid-Plains Professional Services in Grand Island, Nebraska as a community mental health nurse. Then she went to work for Educational Service Unit #9 as a school psychologist.

In 1986 she was asked by Mary Lanning Memorial Hospital to develop its Behavioral Services Unit. While having a background in nursing helped her perform all of these jobs, she said "you can always use your background in nursing in identifying symptoms and problems".

While she noticed and was developing some symptoms in herself with some health issues that included chronic pain, she didn't like to use medications to alleviate the pain. So, she decided to learn more about how to control her own pain, and heard about a process called biofeedback.

Biofeedback is basically using a device to gather information about some body process. It was somewhere in the 1980's when she traveled to the Biofeedback Center at the Menninger Foundation in Topeka Kansas. There she took many classes and studied under Elmer and Alyce Green, pioneers in the industry. They gathered information on a strip chart and would evaluate each epoch, completing a math equation to understand how the brain was functioning. She made many trips there. She also visited Knoxville, Tennessee to train with Dr. Joel Lubar. "She called him up to see if she could go to his clinic." She said the same was true over the years for other doctors across the country. She had a tendency to call people and say "Can I come to your clinic"? So she would go. She wanted to see what they did and she said that was the best way to learn. From her study at Knoxville, she brought home some equipment to begin biofeedback on her own and began to test the equipment on family members and "anyone else she could hook up".

Then in 1991 to her death on January 18, 2013 she owned and operated her own business in Hastings Nebraska called Professional Counseling Associates, Biofeedback and Behavioral Therapy Clinic. Over the last twenty years of her life she has been very involved in helping other people and involved in training and in helping others learn how to help themselves deal with their pain issues, with anxiety and other health issues. She was very well satisfied with the fact that this process was beneficial to nearly all her clients over the years.

Virginia has worked her entire life helping people with their health issues, and it was her hopes and dreams that someone else would be willing to step up and take over her role to help others with the same professional commitment that she had in the area of personal health.

Virginia was a member of Grace United Methodist Church and was associated with many Biofeedback Organizations. She received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Nebraska Biofeedback Society on November 6, 2010. She was also featured in the Hastings Tribune on Saturday, January 17, 2009, Faces of Business article entitled "Entrepreneur...a Life Long Learner".

Virginia's hobbies included cooking, gardening, plants and flowers, bird and squirrel watching. She liked to feed them in the front and back yard of her home.

When she could relax she liked to watch television/movies, Dancing with the Stars, Sharks, Judge Judy, all different types of cooking programs, Jeff Dunham and his puppets as well as other shows and movies. When she could she liked to go to Lincoln to the Lied Center for the Performing Arts with her friend, Maggie McCready to see different shows. She also liked to travel to Nixa, Missouri to visit her daughter's family (son-in-law and two grandchildren). While visiting there she liked to visit Branson Missouri and see different shows and sites. Her most treasured time was the time she spent with her family.

Virginia has gone home to be with her Lord. She was a very, very special and professional lady all her life. God broke the mold after making her, she can never be replaced. Virginia was preceded in death by her parents, sister and husband, Dale.

Left to cherish her memory are her sons, Dan, Michael, Jon and daughter Amy. Also son-in-law Chris Hunt and grandchildren Ashley and Conner Hunt, as well as beloved pets "Minnie" and her bird "Larry".