A rose to everyone involved in making the 76th Columbus Spring Pilgrimage, which ended Saturday, a success. That’s a lot of roses. We thank everyone from the folks at the Columbus-Lowndes Convention & Visitors Bureau, scores of volunteers, the home-owners who so graciously opened their homes, the hostesses who volunteered to help show tourists around, downtown merchants, the city of Columbus, our arts community and, of course, all who took part in the 21 separate events offered this year. The Pilgrimage continues to be one of our city’s top tourist events and a wonderful way to market our city.
A rose to the 81 students who, under the direction of MSMS instructor Chuck Yarborough, completed another excellent production of its “Tales from the Crypt” Friday. Even the weather, which always seems to conspire against the production, could not diminish the success of the event, which coincides with the Pilgrimage each year. This year’s attendance (2,101) only confirms what a delightful job these student do with the series. Great job, kids!
A rose to the Columbus Municipal School District for establishing a student-run TV Talk Show, which will air on My Mississippi (Channel 35). The first show was broadcast Saturday at 11 p.m., admittedly not a prime time slot. Even so, we welcome the district’s efforts in providing an opportunity for its students to be exposed to the communications industry. We also applaud the idea that students, under the supervision of faculty member Andrew Nation, will have a chance to talk about the things that are important to them. Because the district will be charged a fee, we encourage local businesses to get behind this effort by covering this cost.
A rose to the Greater Starkville Development Partnership, corporate sponsors Cadence Bank, Vollor Law Firm and Copy Cow, participating restaurants and, of course, all those who dined at the restaurants for another successful Restaurant Week. The event, designed to promote the city’s restaurants at a historically slow time of the year, continues to be a big hit, not only with dinners, but for local charities. This year, Backpack Buddies, a program that provides ready-to-eat, non-perishable meal packages for Starkville-area school kids was announced as the $5,000 grand prize winner. Nearly 13,000 votes were cast–with over 5,000 for the winning program–during Starkville Restaurant Week which saw 30 restaurants participate in the culinary benefit campaign. The grand prize–presented by Cadence Bank–will go towards starting a high school meal package program for students at Starkville High School, according to Backpack Buddies Coordinator Susan Tomlinson. Grassroots Animal Rescue took home the second place, $1,000 prize presented by Vollor Law Firm. The group received nearly 4,000 votes. The third place finisher, Vets for Vets, received a $500 prize–presented by Copy Cow–for after collecting more than 3,500 votes.
The Dispatch Editorial Board is made up of publisher Peter Imes, columnist Slim Smith, managing editor Zack Plair and senior newsroom staff.
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