The Arts and Cultural Authority of Claxton and Evans County is hosting a grand opening celebration Thursday afternoon to evening, June 18, for the Jack and Muriel Strickland Arts & Cultural Center, in the historic, more than century-old former Claxton High School building at 707 W. Main St., Claxton.

An evening of local musical entertainment in the center’s auditorium, featuring Chris Mitchell and Osjha Anderson Domenicone, beginning at 6 p.m., is scheduled to cap the afternoon’s activities. The open house with public tours starts at 4 p.m., followed by a 5 p.m. dedicatory program and ribbon cutting ceremony.

The evening is planned as a milestone in the community's effort to preserve and revitalize the two-story Classical Revival-style school building, dating from 1922, with its restored Joyce O. NeSmith Auditorium. The work is supported in part by $201,500 in preservation funding from Fox Gives, the grant program associated with the Fox Theatre in Atlanta, for the center to serve as a destination for arts, culture, education and community events in southeast Georgia.