Junior Auxiliary of Columbus revealed its 2013 Charity Ball king and queen Saturday at the 63rd annual Ball held at Trotter Convention Center.
Queen Margaret Fairfax Davis and King John Eugene Reed Jr. were presented to a capacity audience, as was their court of high school seniors who have performed nearly 2,000 hours of service in their community, schools and churches.
The Ball, and Junior Auxiliary’s Report to the Community, generate funds to support the chapter’s year-round service projects that impact children throughout Lowndes County.
This school year, JA members clothed more than 400 students in need and provided in-depth clothing for families who met with tragedies such as fire or flood.
Funds raised also support scholarships, a disability awareness and education program, health and fitness education, a reality fair for high school students, character-building projects and speakers, plus ongoing programs such as Girls Empowered to Model Success and Junior Auxiliary Mentors.
The king
King John Eugene Reed Jr. is a Columbus native and former Commercial Dispatch paper boy, who rode his bicycle through North Columbus to deliver papers. He is a 1966 graduate of Stephen D. Lee High School, where he lettered in track and was a member of a record-setting North State Mile Relay Team.
King Jack graduated from Mississippi State University, completing the pre-med curriculum in just three years. While at MSU, he earned membership into the pre-med honor society, Alpha Epsilon Delta. Upon his return to Columbus from his medical residency, Dr. Reed volunteered as a team doctor under the tutelage of Dr. Wiley Hutchins for the MSU football team coached by Emory Ballard. He has been a loyal supporter of the Mississippi State Alumni Association for over 40 years.
King Jack is a 1973 cum laude graduate of the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson, where he was inducted into the Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Society. Upon receiving his medical degree, he was accepted into the Internship and Residency Program in Internal Medicine at the University of Alabama at Birmingham which he concluded in 1976. Dr. Reed was selected by the staff of UAB as Best Resident for that year.
Dr. Reed has recently been accepted into the Fellowship of American College of Physicians and will be inducted later this month in a ceremony in San Francisco, Calif.
Advancing medicine
Dr. Reed returned to his hometown of Columbus in 1976 and has served as a leader at community hospitals for almost 40 years. He served as chief of staff for a total of four terms at Columbus Hospital and later at Baptist Memorial Hospital-Golden Triangle.
He has also been a member of the Golden Triangle Hospital Board of Trustees and has served as medical director of numerous committees and departments at Baptist including Pharmacy, Hospitalists, Quality, Case Management Utilization Review, and Recruiting. In October 2012, he was appointed the hospital’s first ever chief medical officer.
As a pupil and former laboratory assistant at UMC under Dr. John Bower, a pioneer in kidney disease and dialysis in Mississippi, Dr. Reed brought care for patients with kidney disease to the Golden Triangle. He founded Nephrology Associates and has served as medical director for dialysis units in Columbus, Starkville, Macon and Louisville.
King Jack served at the national level for the parent company Renal Care Group, including membership on its Medical Executive Committee for four years, and was president of the Southeast Region in 1997. He served as chairman of the Executive Board of the Southeast for five years and director of quality management for three years.
From 2000-2004, his dialysis facilities won nine gold, two platinum and one silver award for quality of care. The two platinum awards were the first ever awarded to facilities in the United States.
King Jack has worked with a number of prescription drug companies, including Amgen, in clinical trials research in order to provide new medicines to his patients on dialysis. He has published numerous articles in medical journals and participated in more than 30 clinical trials on medications related to dialysis and chronic kidney disease. He has traveled the country on the Speakers Bureau for American Regent Laboratories, Amgen and Merck as a speaker, speaker’s trainer and author.
In his community
As a landowner in south Lowndes County, Dr. Reed was presented a National Goodyear Award in 1987 for his work with the local Soil and Water Conservation District to prevent soil erosion. He was also presented the Lowndes County Conservation District Wildlife Award in 1987 and in 1997 for his efforts to protect wildlife on his property.
King Jack served as president of the Golden Triangle Swim League from 1980-1985 and received the prestigious Sanders Award for outstanding contribution to competitive swimming.
He was awarded his Eagle Scout Badge at the age of 16 and continues his support of scouting by serving as the Cub Master for Troop 3 in Columbus. He was recently appointed to the local Boy Scouts of America Board of Directors.
Dr. Reed is a 50-plus year member of First United Methodist Church where he serves on an usher team. His wife of 26 years, Beth, is a life member of Junior Auxiliary of Columbus and is a former chairman of Camp Rising Sun, for which her husband served many years as a physician attendee. The king’s daughter, Dr. Bethany Reed Hairston, reigned as queen of the 1996 Pilgrimage Ball (now Charity Ball), and his daughter, Angela, was a member of the 1995 Pilgrimage Court.
King Jack became an early supporter and attendee of the Pilgrimage Ball when he rode his billy goat through downtown Columbus in the 1959 Pilgrimage Parade.
The reigning king has three grandchildren: Anna Reed Hairston, an eighth-grader at Heritage Academy; Nicholas Hairston, a former royal page; and Jack Hairston, who served Saturday as his grandfather’s page.
The queen
Queen Margaret Fairfax Davis is a graduate of Heritage Academy where she was a member of several academic honor societies including the National Honor Society. She was a class officer each of her high school years and was a cheerleader her junior and senior years. She served as president of the LAI Social Club for three years.
She participated in the Lowndes Young Leaders Program and the National Young Leaders Conference in Washington, D.C. During her sophomore year, she received the Soroptomist Club’s Violet Richardson Award which is given to young women whose activities make the community and world a better place. She was presented the Good Citizenship Award her senior year.
Miss Davis has been an active member of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church where she has helped with Bible School and been an acolyte team leader and Vestry Youth Representative. Through her involvement with the Episcopal Young Churchmen, she has participated in many mission trips, including the Gulf Coast Clean-up after Hurricane Katrina and working in homeless shelters in Washington, D.C.
At school
Queen Fairfax is presently a Dean’s List student at Birmingham Southern College in Birmingham, Ala., where she has been a four year recipient of the Greensboro Scholarship, a scholarship based on ACT score and GPA. She has been involved in many philanthropic events on her campus including Halloween on the Hilltop and the Make-a-Wish Foundation Fundraiser.
She has recently completed a year’s service to her Chi Omega Chapter by serving as its president. Her sorority sisters have shown respect and admiration of her leadership abilities by selecting her for various roles including the 2011 New Member Educator.
The leadership at Birmingham Southern selected her as one of 20 people on the Presidential Service Team, which serves as a liaison between the president of the college and the community, and by asking her to be a member of the Senior Gift Campaign, a committee composed of only 22 members of the Class of 2013.
Volunteer spirit
Miss Davis has concentrated her volunteer activities on serving children in need.
During high school, she participated in the Salt and Light Mission Program in Honduras, where she helped lead Bible School and taught young girls to crochet for a living. She also volunteered as a tutor for the HEARTS Program in Columbus and as a counselor for Camp Rising Sun.
While at Birmingham Southern, Queen Fairfax has volunteered as a tutor at Woodrow Wilson Elementary School and also volunteered at summer camps at Mitchell Place, a school for children with autism in Birmingham.
She has been a weekly volunteer at the Benjamin Russell Children’s Hospital in Birmingham. Queen Fairfax has most recently worked in the hematology/oncology unit, where she visits children’s rooms, plays games with them, and talks and listens to them so that their parents can take a break. This past semester she volunteered for over 45 hours of service at the Children’s Hospital.
Miss Davis will receive a Bachelor of Science degree in psychology with a minor in sociology in May from Birmingham Southern. She plans to attend graduate school to receive a master’s degree in family development, with an emphasis in child life specialty so that she can continue her work with and on behalf of children.
She was presented by the Southern Debutante Assembly at its 2010 White and Gold Ball, as well as at the 2012 Beaux Arts Krewe Ball and 2012 Ball of Roses, both in Birmingham. She was invited to be a member of the Birmingham Debutante Club.
She is the daughter of former royalty, Eulalie and John Davis of Columbus. Her mother is a past president and life member of the Junior Auxiliary of Columbus.
Queen Fairfax has two sisters, Mary Katherine, a member of the 2004 Pilgrimage Ball Court, and Florence, who reigned as queen of the 2006 Pilgrimage Ball. She is the granddaughter of former King the late George Stephenson Hazard. Her grandmother, the late Florence McLeod Hazard, founded the Pilgrimage Ball in 1951 when she was president of the Junior Auxiliary of Columbus. She is also the granddaughter of the late Dr. and Mrs. James A. Davis Jr. of Birmingham.
Charity Ball Kings and Queens,
past 10 years
2003 Mr. John Robert Davis
Miss Laura Elizabeth Berry
2004 Mr. Andrew Miller Griffin
Miss Anna Conwill Rice
2005 Mr. Bascom Andrew “B.A.” Atkins
Miss Katherine Elizabeth “Katy” Waters
2006 Mr. Allen Boyd Puckett III
Miss Florence McLeod Davis
2007 Mr. Thomas Kelleam Sneed
Miss Elizabeth Spencer Ford
2008 Mr. Charleigh Ford Jr.
Miss Bailey Blaire Griffin
2009 Mr. James C. Galloway
Miss Elizabeth Harper Ferguson
2010 Mr. Eugene Beard “Gene” Imes
Miss Jennifer Rose Adams
2011 Mr. John Thompson Bean III
Miss Madeline Frances Hardy
2012 Mr. Raymond Michael Waters III
Miss Kendyl Diane Hall
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