At a recent Arts Alive meeting Arlington School District Superintendent Linda Byrnes announced that the anonymous donor who is sponsoring the cost of the sound system to the tune of $76,000 for the new PAC has agreed to go public ?the donor is the Dale and Carol Duskin family. Both Dale and Carol are descendants of historical founding families of Arlington and graduates of Arlington High School. Dale Duskin founded the Arlington Pharmacy after returning with his degree from Washington State University.
I dont think of it as being generous, its just giving back to the community, Dale Duskin said.
Certainly Dale Duskin is not the only Arlington business owner that has contributed significantly to the new performing arts center. He is one of many, while only some have been acknowledged earlier in The Arlington Times.
Another major gift to the PAC came from George Boulton, founder of Flowers by George. The father of a professional pianist, Ken Boulton, George donated a 1941 Steinway grand concert piano from Prosser Piano & Organ in Tacoma. The grand piano was played by the likes of Liberace and Tony Bennett when it was at home in the McCallum Theatre in Palm Desert, Boulton said.
We got a pretty good deal, Boulton said adding the refurbished piano cost $65,280, but a new one of this of this caliber would have cost, I dont know, maybe $150,000 or more.
Boultons son, Ken Boulton, teaches at Southern Louisiana State University and has several recordings, with a new one recently released.
I wanted to make a significant donation to set an example for other local business owners, said Boulton, who is an artist himself, having mostly retired from the artistic business of floral arrangements. His true art form, however, is community service.
Boulton has been an active member of the Arts Alive! committee, which has met every Wednesday morning since the high school opened in 2003. Now the Arts Alive! committe has evolved into the Grand Gala planning committee, and Boulton is recruiting his son to perform at the gala.
Duskin and Boulton will be among the other significant donors on a memorial wall in the foyer of the new theater that is being designed and created by Arlington glass artist Kurt McVay.
Another active Arts Alive member and Arlington business person whose name will appear on the wall, Kathy Burkholder is one of those who woke up at 6 a.m. every Wednesday for the past three years to meet at 7:30 to plan fundraising strategies to help complete the PAC.
Her husbands company, then Higa-Burkholder Associates donated $5,000 and her employer, John Meno, of Edward Jones, also donated a chunkc of change and will be on the wall that will honor all the people and businesses that donated $5,000 or more to the PAC.
While we are starting to plan the gala, Arts Alive still needs to raise another $300,000 to meet our obligation of $2.5 million to the project, Burkholder said.
We have some grant proposals out there that we still have hopes for, she said.
We made $850 at a surprise birthday party for Howard Lanz recently. His friends and family were asked to donate to PAC in lieu of gifts to Howard, Burkholder said adding the night was a very special occasion, with Grammy-award winning David Lanz backing up his brothers band, the Gary Lanz Band, playing dance music for the gathering at Hawthorn Inn.
It was great fun, but we couldnt get the guys to dance, Burkholder joked.
Arlington School District Superintendent Linda Byrnes has announced the absolute deadline for getting on the wall is quickly approaching.
We want folks to know that March 1 is the cutoff,?Byrnes said.
Its a pretty good deal for maybe 100 years of good publicity, she said.