Marion Southerland White was born on May 16, 1914 in Kincaid, Saskatchewan, Canada to Webb and Anna Olson Southerland. She was raised in Montana, and she married Ova Allen White in 1933. She lived the majority of her adult life in Walla Walla, Washington, where Ova established White Brothers Farm and Industrial Supply. She died on April 17, 1998. A 4-H scholarship, sponsered by the Blue Mountain Community Foundation, memorializes the Whites.

Carol White Kirkman '59, born circa 1938, is the daughter of Marion and Ova White. She graduated from Walla Walla High School in 1955, and served as royalty at the Fair and Frontier Days that same year. She then attended Whitman College and married fellow Whitman alum, William G. Kirkman, in their senior year. After graduating they studied at the American Institute of Foreign Trade in Pheonix, Arizona. They would continue to work internationally, and together they had three children: Guillermo Kirkman, Jennifer Kirkman and Ashley Kirkman. She and William later divorced. Carol married Whitman administrator Larry Beaulaurier in 1990, and the two were married for an unknown period of time.