LARAMIE (AP) - The University of Wyoming has received more than $16 million from the sale of a ranch bequeathed to the university, making it the largest gift in UW history.

Clara Toppan, Wyoming's first female certified public accountant, left the 160-acre Lodge Pole Ranch near Wilson to the university when she died in 2001. Two years later, the university announced it planned to sell the ranch for $18.5 million.

On Monday, the university announced it had received more than $16 million for the ranch, and would use the proceeds to support the accounting department in the College of Business, the Toppan Rare Books Library at the American Heritage Center and UW athletics.

"Clara was a dear friend of the University of Wyoming, contributing more than $700,000 during her lifetime," UW President Tom Buchanan said in a news release. "Now, her legacy gift will benefit a variety of academic and athletics programs at the university she loved. We are forever in her debt."

Brent Hathaway, dean of the College of Business, said the college would be able to expand a scholarship program endowed by Toppan. Athletics Director Tom Burman said his department, too, would use part of the gift for scholarships.

Toppan graduated from UW in 1931 as one of the first female graduates of UW's business school.