Contact: James Carskadon
STARKVILLE, Miss.—Mississippi State’s 2016 multi-event observance of national Veterans Day takes place Thursday and Friday [Nov. 10 and 11] both on and off campus.
Honoring service of current and former military personnel, the public programs are being organized by the university’s G.V. “Sonny” Montgomery Center for America’s Veterans, Department of Plant and Soil Sciences and other campus organizations.
Veterans Day activities Friday begin at 8 a.m. on the historic Drill Field with a continuous reading of names of the nearly 7,000 military personnel who have died during the current War on Terror.
At 10 a.m., the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences department holds its tribute at the Veterans Memorial Rose Garden, located across State Highway 182 from the main campus at the R.R. Foil Plant Science Research Center. ROTC members will raise and lower the flag as members of the Famous Maroon Band play the national anthem and other arrangements.
At 2:30 p.m., the Drill Field name-reading pauses for a formal ceremony featuring remarks by President Mark E. Keenum and Vice President for Student Affairs Regina Hyatt. A joint-service color guard will present the colors for a program that also includes personnel with the land-grant institution’s Army and Air Force ROTC programs.
Preceding Friday’s all-day schedule will be 5-K and one-mile runs Thursday [the 10th] sponsored by the MSU Student Veterans Association to benefit both a state veterans’ charity and its own ongoing mission. The runs get underway at 6:30 p.m. at Nusz Hall, with check-in for both taking place at 4:30 p.m. Participants may pay the $20 registration fee at that time or register in advance at https://racesonline.com/events/mississippi-state-veterans-day-5k/registration.
Established in 1878 and organized originally along the lines of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York, MSU today is nationally ranked among the country’s most veteran-friendly institutions of higher learning.
For more on the G.V. “Sonny” Montgomery Center for America’s Veterans, visit www.veterans.msstate.edu.
MSU is Mississippi’s leading university, available online at www.msstate.edu.