Reporter Sharon Montague can be reached at 822-1411 or by e-mail at smontague@salina.com.
Salina Journal
After 25 years, the Salina Art Center's Pignic is making its "swine" song.
The annual benefit will be held, for the last time, from 5:30 to 11 p.m. Saturday at the OCCK transportation building, 340 N. Santa Fe. Tickets are $40 each and may be ordered by calling the art center at 827-1431.
"We've just decided, after talking to various people, that it's probably time to retire the pig and look toward another sort of event/fundraiser that would be very community oriented and feel very open to everyone, like Pignic is," said Wendy Moshier, director of community development for the art center.
Moshier said she and others are "doing our darnedest" to come up with a fundraiser that is as "different and unique" as the Pignic was a quarter of a century ago.
"It will be a bit sad saying goodbye to our pig, but we're looking forward to something new," she said.
This year's Pignic will be much like those in the past -- a dinner of roast pork and other side dishes prepared by Butch's Barbecue, a dance, beverages and a silent auction.
The Blades will play for the dance.
Auction items include a spaghetti dinner for 8-12, prepared by Bob Exline; "Pigs and Pipes," which is a trip to Galva for a barbecue dinner in a van with bagpiper Terry Ferguson, who will play mini-concerts during stops along the way; and a nighttime tour of the Garden of Eden in Lucas the weekend before Halloween with a guide dressed as founder Samuel Dinsmore.
Also up for auction will be several trips, including a four-night, five-day stay at a log cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains and stays in Steamboat Springs and Breckenridge, Colo.
A list of all auction items is available on the art center's Web site, www.salinaartcenter.org. Prebids may be placed until 5 p.m. Friday by calling the art center.
nReporter Sharon Montague can be reached at 822-1411 or by e-mail at smontague@salina.com.
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