Staff Report
The first African-American woman to sit on the state’s highest court will give the keynote address at the 31st annual Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Humanitarian Awards Service and Celebration.
Associate Justice Patricia Timmons-Goodson was appointed to the N.C. Supreme Court in February of 2006. With 23 years of service, she’s one of the state’s longest serving active judges.
Timmons-Goodson is the advisor to the American Bar Association Commission on women in the profession, co-editor of the Judges’ Journal and secretary of the Appellate Judges Conference. She’s also a member of the Morehead Scholarship Selection Committee for the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
From 1990 to 2003, she co-hosted and co-produced the cable television program “Dimensions of Justice” in an effort to increase citizens’ confidence in the court system.
The service begins at 3 p.m. Sunday at Mount Zion Missionary Baptist Church, 1920 Shirley Ave.
The 2008 honorees are: the Rev. Buddy Hoffner, Lillian Morgan, Betty Dan Spencer, the Revs. William and Patricia Turner and Dee Dee Wright.
Service organizers will also announce the winners of the Samuel R. Johnson Jr. Memorial Scholarship.
Other community events in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. Day are:
– The Hefner VA Medical Center will hold a panel discussion tonight in observance of King’s birthday.
The topic of the discussion, scheduled for 7 p.m. in the Building 19 Chapel, is “Do We Need Another March?”
Victor Boone, an attorney with Wake County Legal Services, will serve as facilitator. Panelists will include Salisbury Councilman Pete Kennedy; the Rev. Arthur Heggins, pastor of St. Luke’s Baptist Church; the Rev. Bill Godair, pastor of Cornerstone Church; Dr. Bryant Norman, president of the Salisbury NAACP; Dr. Martha Starks, pastor of New Testament Word of Faith; Adina Martin, Eladio Cintron and Edwina Gray-Wright of the VA; and Kim Williams, a VA intern.
The Jubilee Chorus, directed by Kay Norman, will perform.
– On Friday, the Rev. Donald Anthony, pastor of Crown in Glory Lutheran Church, will speak at 1:30 p.m. in the Social Room of Building 6 at the VA. His topic will be “Adversity Won’t Stop Us.”
The Crown in Glory Lutheran Church Mass Choir will sing.
For more information on these events, contact Chaplain Ethel Bamberg-Revis, 2008 Chair of the MLK Jr. Birthday Committee, at 704-638-3330.
– Judge Donald L. Graham will deliver the keynote message during the 22nd annual Martin Lutheran King Jr. Breakfast on Monday at the Salisbury Civic Center.
Graham, a Salisbury native, is a 1967 graduate of J.C. Price High School.
The 7:30 a.m. breakfast kicks off a day of citywide festivities observing the national holiday.
Graham is the son of Mildred Donald Graham and the late Ernest Graham. He was a member of the last graduating class from Price, Salisbury’s former all black high school. Graham holds a bachelor’s degree, with magna cum laude honors, from West Virginia State University, and a J.D. degree from Ohio State University College of Law.
Graham served a four-year term in Germany as an Army attorney and was later stationed at Homestead Air Force base. He left the service in 1979. Graham became a member of the U.S. District Attorney’s office and served as chief of the major narcotics traffickers section, special prosecutions, organized crime and racketeering.
He opened his own practice in 1984. In 1991, President George H.W. Bush appointed Graham as U.S. District Judge for the Southern District of Florida. Graham was the first African-American federal judge in the state of Florida. He has been named one of Miami’s most influential black business professionals by Network Miami.
Graham’s community activities include the 5,000 Role Models of Excellence Project, the board of directors of the Performing Arts Center for Greater Miami Trust, Network Miami Magazine ó Miami’s 50 Most Influential Black Business Professionals and the Just the Beginning Foundation.
Those interested in attending may contact the city of Salisbury’s human resources Department at 704-638-5217.
– Salisbury’s annual Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday Parade will start at 2 p.m. Monday in the 300 block of Main and Liberty Streets below the Rowan County courthouse.
Floats will line up on Church Street and Jackson Street at noon and the parade will proceed south on Main Street to Monroe Street, where it will turn west and end at Livingstone College.
This year’s theme is “40 Days of Nonviolence: Building the Beloved Community.”