Arts & Lifestyle Of Interest **? Hall joins SECCA Patricia Hall started as the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art's development and member ship officer on May 15. Hall has been a part of the cultural community in North Carolina for more than 20 years. Most recent ly, Hall served as the director of the Annual Fund for the North Carolina Symphony for nine years. "I want to build an excit ing membership program for the community so they can enjoy activities at SECCA to the fullest extent," she says. "1 am also anticipating partner ing with the corporate part ners so we can provide pro grams for their employees and Hall clients. One of Hall's first projects is creating a New Era Fund at SECCA. "SECCA is entering a new era of exciting pro grams and collaboration with emerging artists. To improve the overall experience our visitors receive, I hope many people will support the New Era Fund to provide a stable financial foundation for new pro grams to begin." Hall is relishing her move to Winston-Salem from Raleigh. She said, "I am enjoying the many cultural offerings here in the City of the Arts, and I look forward to meeting the citizens of this great community." Laura to return to 'General Hospital' LOS ANGELES (AP) - Genie Francis is check ing back into "General Hospital." The 46-year-old actress again will reprise her role as Laura on the ABC daytime soap opera begin ning Aug. 26. The character's 1981 fairy-tale wedding to Luke (played by Anthony Geary) was watched by 30 mil lion viewers and landed the couple on the cover of Newsweek magazine. Francis began playing Laura in 1976. "This is a short visit," Francis told The Associated Press last Friday. "It's a mother-daughter story. Years ago when I started playing the character as a 14-year-old girl, it was a mother-daughter story, only I was the daughter. So it's kinda cool this is full circle. It's nice to come back for visits. "General Hospital' is my home." Laura was last seen slipping in and out of a cata tonic state in 2007. The upcoming appearance will feature Laura in a story line with daughter Lulu. Francis, who now runs a home-furnishing shop in Belfast, Maine, said she was told that Laura would n't be killed off during her latest guest stint. Francis won a supporting actress Daytime Emmy in 2007 for previously reprising the role. Wal-Mart pulls 'racist' comic HOUSTON (AP) - Wal-Mart is pulling from its shelves a popular Mexican comic book that features a protagonist with exaggerated black features after a Houston customer complained that "Memin Pinguin" was racist. The latest issue of the comic, "Memin para presi dente" (Memin for President), was being sold in select Wal-Mart stores that have a large Latino customer base, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. spokesman Lorenzo Lopez in Bentonville, Ark., said. But the discount giant decided to remove the comic from stores nationwide last week. "We understand that Memin is a popular figure in Mexico," the company said in a statement. "However, given the sensitivity to the negative image Memin can portray to some, we felt that it was best to no longer carry the item in our stores. We apologize to those customers who may have been offended by the book's images."1 The Memin Pinguin comic was part of a series of Spanish-language titles carried in Wal-Mart stores. The comic, first published in the 1940s, revolves around Memin Pinguin, a small Mexican-Cuban boy whose street smarts and adventures reflect the life of a poor boy in Mexico City. The boy, portrayed as a likeable rascal, earns money shining shoes and sell ing newspapers to help his mother. The characters of Memin and his mother have been criticized as throwbacks to stereotypical depic tion of blacks. It is not the first time Memin has sparked debate in this country. Hollywood now urging kids to spurn tobacco A LOS ANGELES (AP) - Hollywood to kids: Our movies glamorize smoking, but don't start yourself. Six major studios will include anti-smoking announcements on millions of DVDs of motion pic tures that include scenes with tobacco use. The public service announcements will appear on films rated O, PG and PG-13. The participating studios: Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Twentieth Century Fox, Universal Pictures-, Walt Disney Co. and ' Warner Bros. The deal involving the studios and the state of California was brokered by the Entertainment Industry Foundation - a philanthropy group. The state developed the anti-smoking announcements 7 _ i ? Cheris Hodges Author explores the world of pro sports Cheris Hodges will be featured in Romantic Times Magazine CHRONICLE STAFF REPORT ' a Charlotte-based author Cheris Hodges, a former Chronicle and News & Record reporter, will be featured in the September issue of Romantic Tunes, a national magazine that features authors and their books. The article featuring Hodges focuses on football players as heroes in romance novels. The Johnson C. Smith graduate will release "Let's Get It On" in August - a book that fea tures a fictional Carolina Panthers player as. the hero. In the book, the wide receiver Maurice Goings is left at the altar when his fianc?, Lauryn, leaves him for another woman. While he is left to figure out what has happened to his life, his high school sweetheart, Kenya Taylor, is in Atlanta enjoying the fruits of her success as a lawyer. Maurice and Kenya parted on bad terms when the football star betrayed her to be with Lauryn. Kenya thought that Maurice was in her past, but when she is forced to relocate to Charlotte, she knows that there is a good chance that he will once again be in her pres ent. A huge football fan, the Charlotte resident was eager to pen a novel revolving around her favorite sport and favorite team - well one of her favorite teams. Hodges is actually a die hard Dallas Cowboys fan, but she will cheer for the Carolina Panthers when they are play ing anyone other than Dallas. Hodges, now a writer at Charlotte's Creative Loafing, is the author of seven nov els, including "Just Can't Get Enough," "The Business of Love" and "A Love of Her Own." "Let's Get It On," he eighth novel, is her second book with Dafina, Kensington Books' African- American romance line. Family of musicians to receive prestigious medal CHRONICLE STAFF REPORT The Healing Force, a well known local group known for weaving music with tradition al African storytelling, will receive a lofty honor later this month during one of its con certs. The group will be present ed with the International (Ralph) Bunche Medal on Thursday, July 31 at The Blessings Project, 823 Reynolda Rd. The group will be the first Bunche Laureates to also be named Goodwill Ambassadors of the Arts. The honor recognizes the group for its 33 years of bridging and celebrating African and African American culture through its music. Members of the Anderson family make up The Healing Force. Husband and wife Joseph and Gail Anderson founded the group and later added their son, Karim, and daughter, Sonji. The International Bunche Medal was crafted in 2003 to honor the 100th anniversary of the birth of Dr. Ralph J. Bunche, who in 1950 became the first United States citizen and first person of color to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. The Bunche Medal was designed by artist Alex Shagin, designer of the Moscow Olympic medals and whose coins and works of art are in museums, galleries, and private collections around the world. Other reciepients of the medal include Nelson Mandela and Paul Rusesabagina, whose story was told in the film, "Hotel Photo courtesy of The Healing Force The Andersons have been entertaining audiences for year. Rwanda." The Healing Force will receive its honor at 7 p.m., before its benefit concert to raise funds for the children of Zambougou, Mali, who are literally hand building their own school and adjacent sus tainable vegetable garden. A donation of $10 is being requested for admission to the concert. Tickets are available a t www.TheHealingForceOnline .com, Kindred Spirits, Body & Soul and Golden Flower Tai Chi, all on of which are Trade Street. A Look Back < Books chronicle the city 's past CHRONICLE STAFF REPORT Winston-Salem's glorious and storied past is the subject of two new books. Nashville, Tenn.-based Turner Publishing Co.'s "Historic Photos of Winston Salem" features about 200 rarely seen photos taken in the city over the last century, while "Winston-Salem: A Twin City History," by author Michael Bricker, tells the story of the city's emergence from a Moravian settlement, to an industrial powerhouse, to modern times. Bricker 's book is published by Charleston, S.C. -based The History Press Inc. While wealthy and powerful families with last names like Reynolds and Hanes are often associated with Winston-Salem's success, Bricker uses the book to also shed light on the workers and other average folks whose con tributions have often been ignored. The images in "Historic Photos of Winston-Salem" come from the Forsyth County Public Library, the Library of Congress and the North Carolina State Archives. The descriptive captions for each photo were written by Wade G. Dudley, an East Carolina University professor who has penned several books on histo ry "I firmly believe that to understand the present and have any hope for a better future, we must understand the past. Old photographs are a way of understanding change and the agents of change," said Dudley, who penned a similar book on Wilmington. Among the photographs in the book are vintage shots of landmarks like Old Salem and Wake Forest University and of historic visits by dignitaries See Books on All Come On Down! PKNew?F<*VOSN Alfonso Ribeiro, of "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" and "Silver Spoons" fame, is back on television. He has signed on to host "Catch 21" on the Game Show Network. The show combines the card game 21 with pop-culture trivia questions and debuts July 21 at 7:30 p.m. % Singer Webb will perform CHRONICLE STAFF REPORT The singer/ songwriter who has been compared to the likes of Carole King, Janis Ian and Joni Mitchell will perform at The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Winston-Salem on Saturday (July 19) at 7 p.m. Amy Carol Webb, who has been described as a 'one-woman songweaver,' will perform her unique brand of acoustic music at the church, which is located at 4055 Robinhood Rd. The Oklahoma native's music reflects the same pioneering spir it, tenacity, integrity and never quit grit that her Native American ancestors exhibited when they settled the territory that would become Oklahoma. At the age of five, her folks put her on the stage for the first time. Eventually, she got her first guitar - a used Harmony gut string - and taught herself songs such as "Red River Valley." By 14, she was writing and ? ? ? ? ? Photo couneiy Of Amy WtM. Amy Carol Webb has devel oped a loyal following. piaying music ai nometown events and studying works from a diverse palette of artists, everyone from Guthrie to Gershwin, Leonard Cohen to Leonard Bernstein, Bonnie Raitt to Beverly Sills. She graduated college with a degree in performing arts and hit the road, touring most of the country, Japan, Canada and Mexico. After taking a break from music to raise her two sons, Webb reemerged in 1995 and has since released five popular and critical ly acclaimed independent CDs. Tickets to the concert are $15. For more information contact the Rev. Charlie Davis, of The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Winston-Salem, at 336-473-0318. Hear samples of Webb's music at wwwamycarolwebb .com/music .html

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