LDS Scene

The Polynesian Cultural Center in Laie, Hawaii, is having its first million-visitor year. It took six years after the center was opened in 1963 for the first million visitors to come. Now, with recently expanded facilities covering 42 acres, the center easily accommodates one million visitors in one year—and would welcome many more.

BYU—Hawaii Campus has announced the dedication of the new Joseph F. Smith library, to be held on 21 November 1977. Elder Bruce R. McConkie of the Council of the Twelve, a grandson-in-law of President Joseph F. Smith, will dedicate the building.

The best radio spot of any kind, as well as the best public service spot announcement—these were the two “Andy” awards given to the Church’s Public Communications Department for its famous “Love” radio spot. “I just called to say that I love you, and I appreciate everything that you do,” says a girl on the phone to her father—and he answers, “Who is this?” The message got home—especially to the Advertising Club of New York, which gave the award.

The much-honored BYU films “John Baker’s Last Race” and “Cipher in the Snow” were chosen to represent the United States in a world peace festival of young teenagers in Moscow, USSR, in July. The conference was attended by thousands of teenagers from all over the world.

The second runners-up in two beauty contests recently were Latter-day Saint young women. Helen Ng Puay Ngoh, an active member of the Singapore Branch, was second runner-up in the Miss Asia Contest, held in Singapore in June. And former BYU student Glenna Anne Jenks, recently returned from a mission to New Zealand, was second runner-up in the Miss Indian America pageant held in Sheridan, Wyoming.

Winners in another competition were recently announced: Charlene Anderson Newell of Evanston, Wyoming, won first place in the Relief Society Song Contest with her song, “A Woman’s Prayer.” Second place was awarded to Ruth Benson Lehenbauer of Dearborn, Michigan, and Janice Kapp Perry and Val Camenish Wilcox received an honorable mention.

New chairman of the national Cub Scout Committee is a Latter-day Saint—Rodney H. Brady of Los Angeles, California, President of the Los Angeles Stake.

Sister Phyllis Brown Marriott has been elected national president of the American Mothers Committee. At the same meeting of the committee, President Barbara Smith of the Relief Society was named to the board of directors, while Belle Spafford and Adelaide McAllister were elected as third and sixth vice-presidents, respectively.

The 17,000-member American Society for Public Administration has a new president—H. George Frederickson, of the Cheney Ward, Spokane Washington Stake. Brother Frederickson, president of Eastern Washington State College at Cheney, is the second Latter-day Saint to preside over the ASPA: Elder G. Homer Durham of the First Quorum of the Seventy was president in 1959–60.

In the devastating Santa Barbara fire, which destroyed two hundred homes, only four Latter-day Saint families were affected, and there were no serious injuries in the blaze.

News of BYU: A new master’s degree program in secondary education began this summer in Mexico City. Conducted entirely in Spanish, the degree-granting program is offered by the BYU College of Education and the Division of Continuing Education for teachers in the Church Education System. Most of the twenty-two students in the pilot program this summer were native Mexicans.

BYU’s poet-in-residence, Clinton F. Larson, was one of the main speakers at the Royal Jubilee Conference on the Arts and Communications, held in London, England, in July. Dr. Larson spoke on “The Poets of Western America.”

Former BYU president Ernest L. Wilkinson has donated a part-ownership of a prestigious 17-story apartment building in Houston, Texas, to BYU. Brother Wilkinson specified that one-third of the gift was for the BYU Translation Sciences Institute, and the other two-thirds were to be used in support of the LDS Church Education System in Mexico and Latin America, and for student loans in Latin America, the Far East, and the Pacific Islands.