■^Morrisvifle Sl Preston
The Proaress
Published Monthly
Morrisville, NC
September 30,1998
Morrisville may get world class arts center
By Mary Beth Phillips
Staff writer
A site in Morrisville is in the run
ning for the prestigious Performing
Arts Institute of North Carolina, and
members of the town board of com
missioners couldn’t be more excited
about the idea.
The Performing Arts Institute, the
dream of the late Terry Sanford,
would be home to theaters, class
rooms and a dormitory for artists-in-
residence.
Actor Tony Randall has expressed
an interest in basing his repertory
company at the new center, which
has been described as a “world
class” center similar to the Lincoln
and Kennedy centers. The American
Dance Festival, which has outgrown
its space at Duke University, would
also be based at the new center.
Judge Robinson O. Everett told the
Morrisville board on September 14
that the list of sites has been nar-
‘I like the idea that it’s in the Shiloh commu
nity, which I think is a very remarkable com
munity, for tradition, for history.’
—Judge Robinson O. Everett,
property owner
rowed to five, and his land in the still in the running. There are two
Shiloh community next to Imperial other sites in Durham, one in
Center and split by the new 1-540, is Hillsborough and one in the
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Michael Jordan chips on to the green at the Highlands’ 18th hole at Prestonwood Country Club during the Jimmy V Classic.
Michael Jordan, Mia Hamm, Scott
Wolf boost Jimmy V to record crowds
By Mary Beth Phillips
Staff writer
Jordan Flake, an eighth grader
from Raleigh, hoped that his
father’s visit to Michael
Jordan’s restaurant in Chicago
would help him get the super
star’s autograph.
Clutching a Michael Jordan
shopping bag, which also con
tained a menu from the Chicago
eatery, he waited with his
friend, Ali Gholizadeh (who
had brought along an ordinary
basketball) to catch the pro bas
ketball player’s attention during
the Jimmy V Celebrity Golf
Classic on August 30.
But the young fan will have to
find another way to grab the
star’s attention as autographs
by Jordan were few and far
between with several thousand Party of Five's Scott Wolf greets a fan on the course,
fans crowded around him on all throngs of young female fans following him all afternoon.
18 holes and with a bevy of
security guards ensuring that those fans didn’t
get too close.
But Michael Jordan was not the only attrac
tion that caused a record crowd to plunk down
their $5 and attend the golf classic.
Mike Medina of west Raleigh and Keith
Brooks of Cary were among quite a contin
gent who followed Mia Hamm, the profes
sional soccer player who, like Jordan, made
her name at the University of North Carolina
at Chapjl Hill.
"I didn’t think much of soccer as a sport
until I saw Carolina women’s soccer,”
Medina said. “They're great. They play the
way it’s meant to be played, aggressively.”
Hamm gracefully signed autographs for her
fans, and she also played a mean game of
golf
“I could take some lessons from her!” said
Larry Phillips of Raleigh after a particularly
good shot.
His daughter, Meghan, a sixth grader and a
soccer player herself said she already had
Hamm’s autograph. She had sent her a letter
and asked her for a picture with her auto
graph, and it came in the mail.
Kerry and Erin Soukup had
brought a poster of Mia, bought
at the US National team game
in Washington, DC, and Hamm
cordially signed it.
Then there was the young,
teenage contingent who
swooned over Scott Wolf of
the television show Party of
Five.
“He was who we came to
see,” said Tawny Brown and
Alicia Wilson, who waited in a
long line to pose with the TV
celebrity for photographs.
Patrick Duffy, who now stars
on Step by Step, was also popu
lar with the teens, while their
parents laughed and recalled
the Dallas days.
“I grew up with Dallas," said
Vicki Kauffman, a Preston resi
dent who was watching the'
stars go by her back yard. “He’s
such a clean-cut personality."
Prestonwood Country Club members are
given free tickets to the golf classic, to make
up for the fact that they can’t play on the
course during the weekend. But some did not
take advantage of the tickets. Sherry Stine,
Kauffman’s neighbor, said her husband was
playing golf at North Ridge Country Club on
Sunday.
Many lawn chairs were set up in back yards.
Billy Deering, at the 14th green of Fairways
course, was offering Bloody Marys to all of
See JORDAN, page 2
Research Triangle Park.
Everett offered the land for sale or
lease to the steering committee
made up of 30 prominent business,
political and university leaders. It is
part of his mother’s estate and has
been held in trust for the law schools
at Duke University and the
University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill.
There are about 10 acres on the
north side of the interstate, and
about 23 acres on the other side.
Leaders for the institute have said
they would need at least 10 acres for
the center.
Morrisville Mayor Gordon
Cromwell said Everett’s site is
“probably as good a location as any
in the Triangle. It’s the best location
because of 1-540 and the transit sys
tem when that comes through.”
Everett concurred. “It is in the cen
ter of the Triangle . . . with accessi
bility to the airport, accessibility to
See WORLD, page 3
Board approves
180-foot tower
By Mary Beth Phillips
Staff Writer
Saying they had no other choice,
the Morrisville Board of
Commissioners reluctantly
approved a communications tower
for BellSouth Mobility at the meet
ing Sept. 14—and listened to a pre
sentation by AT&T Wireless asking
for another tower.
The BellSouth request had been
tabled at the previous meeting,
August 24, after Commissioners
C.T. Moore and Leavy Barbee orig
inally led a vote to deny the request.
Cautioned by Town Attorney Frank
Gray, they withdrew their motion
and tabled the request.
Gray Stiers, representing
BellSouth had brought sliek, profes
sional notebooks in support of his
request in July. The 160-foot high
tower will be located on the J.F.
Wilkerson property, 1,100 feet to
the east of NC 54 near the future
extension of McCrimmon Parkway.
BellSouth will lease a 50-foot by
50-foot section of the 9.5-acre
Wilkerson property on which to
locate the lower.
The board requested that
BellSouth move the tower back 50
feet away from the proposed
McCrimmon Parkway extension.
The vote to grant the special use
permit for the tower was unani-
See TOWN, page 3
Interactive Magic hits
mark with new game
Morrisville company completes IPO
of 2.6 million shares this summer
By Ron Page
Staff Writer
Ever dream of being a Navy pilot
at the controls of a fighter plane
poised to take off from the aircraft
carrier deck of a ship like, let’s say,
the USS Abraham Lincoln?
Picture the ship plowing through
the waves in enemy waters as you
sit in the cockpit with the ability to
click on every switch inside the air
craft. That’s when the excitement
begins, when dreams can come true.
The much-anticipated iF/A-18E
Carrier Strike Fighter CD-ROM
game developed by Morrisville-
based Interactive Magic, the award
winning developer and publisher of
Internet, online and CD-ROM
games, has arrived at retail stores.
What it offers is a realistic simula
tion of the US Navy’s new F/A-18-
E Super Hornet, allowing players to
fly exciting missions in both the
Persian Gulf and Aegean (Greece
and Turkey).
It can be scary.
You suddenly become a wartime
pilot, sitting snug at the realistic
controls, and with a click you’re
suddenly hurling skyward with
throttle wide open. The ability to
‘cat shot’ (catapult shot while tak-
ing-off from the ship) is yours. So is
the challenge of landing your jet
back on the carrier while it is steam
ing along in the ocean. In between
it’s sheer excitement. It will get you
to the edge of your seat, increase
breathing, even make you inadver
tently duck. This is no kid’s game.
Designed by Interactive Magic’s
Jim Harler, a retired Marine Corps
A-6 “Intruder” navigator. Carrier
Strike Fighter contains a wide vari
ety of missions, each designed to
‘With the release of
iF-22 Persian Gulf
v5. Seven Kingdoms
Plus, and other new
titles, 1998 will be
another great year
for our company. ’
—“Wild BiU” Stealey,
Interactive Magic Chairman
accurately simulate battle situations.
“Missions vary from escorting F-
15 fighters deep into enemy territo
ry to protecting allied naval forces
stationed off the coastline,” he said,
noting that the company’s 25th CD-
ROM title, iF-22 Persian Gulf ver
sion 5.0, a major upgrade of the
award-winning iF-22, had been
released earlier this year.
“When we started Interactive
Magic in 1994, we were determined
to quickly become one of the lead
ing simulation and strategy game
companies in the world,” said
Interactive Magic Chairman “Wild
Bill” Stealey.
“With Apache, Hind, WarBirds,
iF-22, Capitalism, Seven Kingdoms,
and other award winning titles, we
have certainly made our mark. With
the release of iF-22 Persian Gulf v5.
Seven Kingdoms Plus, and other
new titles, 1998 will be another
great year for our company.”
Earlier this year the company
became the Triangle’s first public
computer gamemaker.
See INTERACTIVE, page 6
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