ARTS COUNCIL HONORS GOV., BETTY HEARNES

CHARLESTON -- Former Missouri Gov. Warren Hearnes and Betty C. Hearnes were recently honored for their work in establishing the Missouri Arts Council. This year is the council's 30th anniversary.

Betty Hearnes was also honored by the Women Legislators of Missouri as the winner of the DeVerne Lee Calloway Award.

State Arts Council Chairman Dr. James Olson said Betty Hearnes was a driving force in establishing the council and in securing financial support from the legislature. Warren Hearnes was the architect of the legislation that established the council.

Warren Hearnes told the General Assembly at the time of the bill's passage:

"It is axiomatic that the culture of a state cannot be created by statute. However, it is just as true that legislation can help industrial prosperity. Both are in the public interest and are matters of public health and welfare. Few today will deny that economic growth depends to a great degree on cultural progress. Many other Missourians and I believe that the Arts are too important to leave to charity."

Missouri was the second state to give financial support to the arts.

Betty Hearnes said, "Giving state support to the arts and legislatively creating an Arts Council gave credence to an organization which might help solve many of the problems of the world by giving people a chance to create, to rise above the masses, to live themselves, to create."

She said many people would never have had exposure to the arts without the Council of the Arts. "We can never measure its worth or the lives these programs have touched, but it is enough to know that each of us were a part of a brief shining moment in someone's life."

The DeVerne Lee Calloway Award presented to Betty Hearnes is given annually to a Missouri woman who has made major contributions to equality and social justice by furthering legislation concerning equal opportunities for all Missourians in areas such as education, housing and employment.

Sixteen women were nominated this year for the award, which reads "Women who have changed the world."