The 20th annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Commemorative Breakfast, with keynote speaker Stan Whitted, retired area superintendent for Volusia County Schools, music teacher/director and community activist, will be held Monday, Jan. 16. 

The public is invited to join the celebration honoring King and his dream, beginning at 7:45 a.m. at Stetson University’s Rinker Field House inside the Hollis Center,600 N. Bert Fish Drive, DeLand.

Admission is $5 per person and includes a full buffet and program of speakers, prayer and music. The celebration closes with a march from the Stetson campus through downtown DeLand to the Chisholm Community Center, 520 S. Clara Ave., DeLand.

Tickets are available in advance from David Staples, 386-734-8327, and at the door. A retired educator, Staples is a member of the community-based MLK Planning Committee that initiated the breakfast in the early 1980s.

Highlights of the program will include:

• Welcome by Stetson President Dr. Wendy B. Libby
• Invocation, Blessing and Benediction by Bishop Eugene Collier, New St. John Missionary Baptist Church;
• Remarks about the occasion by Dr. Monet Bradley;
• Solo by Jack Starke;
• Greetings and remarks by state and local representatives and school officials;
• Keynote speech by Stan Whitted, retired area superintendent for Volusia County Schools, music teacher/director and community activist;
• Special remarks by Gloria Denston with the Rotary Club and Clarence “Bo” Davenport; and
• March led by Pastor Troy Bradley, Greater Union First Baptist Church, and other local ministers.

“We welcome everyone to take part,” said Bradley about the breakfast, program and march. “Dr. King’s dream was for all people.”