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Homecoming Activities Include Alum Recognitions


Mississippi College's 2007 Homecoming will include a golf tournament, a Choctaws football game, a parade and an awards brunch to salute top-notch alums like Clintonians Alice and Graham Smith.

There's much more on the MC schedule - from tailgating to the Follies - that's booked for the Oct. 19-20 weekend. The festivities should draw thousands of alumni to the Clinton campus and attract a large contingent of faculty, staff and students to a smorgasbord of activities. This year's theme is "My Space, My Life, My Dreams."

A Hattiesburg native who retired in January as MC's director of public relations, Alice Smith never dreamed she and her husband, Graham, would be named the newest recipients of the Order of the Golden Arrow award. "I'm so incredibly humbled," said Alice Smith, whose passion for music brought her and Graham together as MC students in the late 1950s and early 1960s. "I can't believe they would include me," she said. "That's a big thing."

A 1961 MC graduate, Graham Smith has served as director of the music department of the Mississippi Baptist Convention since 1981.

Since retiring, Alice Smith has been more involved with her husband's work at different Baptist churches in Mississippi, from Natchez to Columbia. She's devoted more time to reading books, writing a column for the Baptist Record and enjoying their grandkids. The Smiths' two children and their spouses are all MC grads.

The Order of the Golden Arrow honors alumni or friends of the Christian university who have made outstanding achievements in their professions, businesses or careers. It recognizes exceptional performance or leadership.

Other top awards to be given out during Homecoming include Alumnus of the Year. That honor will go to Brookhaven banker Bill Sones, the chairman of MC's Board of Trustees. For more than 35 years, Sones has "dedicated his time, talent and resources to his profession, his community, his church and his family," said President Lee Royce. Sones is a 1981 MC business administration graduate. He's president and CEO of the Bank of Brookhaven, an institution he co-founded in 2000 and serves on the board of deacons at First Baptist Church in Brookhaven. He and his wife, Theresa, have five children, all MC graduates.

MC leaders will present the honors to celebrate a list of graduates, including Young Alumnus of the Year, at an awards brunch Saturday Oct. 20 at 10 a.m. at Anderson Hall in the B.C. Rogers Student Center. The cost is $12 per person.

The weekend kicks off with the Homecoming Golf Tournament at Live Oaks Golf Course on Friday Oct. 19. There's lunch at noon with the golfing to begin at 1:15 p.m. The format will be a four-man scramble and the cost is $55.

Other events include:

Self Hall's open house from 4:30 p.m. until 5:30 p.m. on Friday to show off $1.2 million in renovations to the home of the School of Business. The work includes an upgrade for eight classrooms and a financial services lab with a ticker streaming the latest news from Wall Street.

The Follies will be 6 p.m. Friday at Swor Auditorium. Seating is limited. Tickets are $5.

An International House open house at 201 Monroe Street (across from the First Baptist Church activities building). It's from 11 a.m. until 12:30 p.m. Saturday.

Homecoming parade at 12:30 p.m. Saturday. Athletic events later in the day range from the Lady Choctaws soccer game at Longabaugh Field with Mary Hardin-Baylor to the Choctaws football game against American Southwest Conference foe Mary Hardin-Baylor at 2 p.m. Last year, the Crusaders defeated the Choctaws 41-14 in Belton, Texas.

During the day, the MC bookstore and Samuel Marshall Gore Art Galleries will be open to visitors to the Clinton campus.

For more details, go to the website www.mc.edu/alumni or call toll-free at 1-866-232-3945 or contact alumni affairs director Ross Aven at 601- 925-3228 or aven@mc.edu

PHOTO: Alice and Graham Smith