UNIVERSITY TO HONOR MLK WITH LECTURE TONIGHT

In observance of the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, Old Dominion University will honor Dr. King's legacy on Tuesday, Jan. 16 with a lecture by Elaine R. Jones, director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF).

Jones will deliver the Martin Luther King Jr. Day Lecture at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in the North Cafeteria of Webb University Center.

Mamie E. Locke, mayor of Hampton, Va., the city's first popularly elected woman and the first African American to hold the post, also will receive the Old Dominion Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Award. Locke also is dean of the School of Liberal Arts and Education at Hampton University.

Born in Norfolk, Va., Jones graduated with honors in political science from Howard University and served in the Peace Corps, becoming one of the first African Americans to serve in Turkey. She then became the first black woman to enroll in the University of Virginia School of Law and was its first female African- American graduate.

Upon graduation, Jones pursued her lifelong goal by joining the NAACP's Legal Defense Fund staff and, with the exception of two years in a government post, she has remained there since. As a member of LDF, she has made significant contributions to U.S. legislation, including serving as counsel of record in Furman vs. Georgia, a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case that abolished the death penalty in 37 states.

The LDF was founded in 1940 under the leadership of the late Thurgood Marshall, who later became the first black U.S. Supreme Court justice. As LDF's first director-counsel, Marshall led the successful campaign in the landmark 1954 Supreme Court ruling in Brown vs. Board of Education, which not only outlawed segregation in public schools but also initiated the dismantling of all forms of government-sanctioned racial discrimination.

Jones' lecture is free and open to the public. For more information, call 683-3116.