OXFORD, Miss. (WTVA) -- Residents of north Mississippi were honored for their acts of service at the 105th Founders Day Celebration.
The event pays tribute to men and women who put forth extra effort in volunteering for their community.
"There's a struggle to keep Oxford neat and clean with signs, ugly signs, poles and lines all over our streets," Mayor Pro Tem Ulysses Howell said. "We cleaned that up and we now have smaller signs up and down Jackson Avenue and South/North Lamar."
In order for someone to receive recognition and to be honored by the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc., they have to donate their time and services towards making a positive difference in the community.
"It doesn't matter what economic status that this person comes from, their wealthy or their middle class or at poverty level," Upsilon Iota Omega President Angela Stringer said. "Just as long as this person is willing to give time and committment to volunteering in the communities[, it's good.]"
Also at this year's ceremony, the sorority announced it is donating funds to an organization that is renovating a church building into a digital museum and multicultural center dedicated to African-American history.
The building was last owned by John Grisham and donated over a decade ago.
"Artifacts will be displayed in digital form on screens, video screens, touch screens, and will tell the stories and the history of various people and activities here in Oxford and Lafayette County," Oxford/Lafayette County Heritage Museum President Jim Pryor said.
The building should be completely overhauled and refurbished into a museum sometime this summer.
It was originally constructed in 1870 by freed slaves and was the first church built in Oxford after the Civil War.
