GENTRY — GENTRY - Rick Parker, owner of Parker Conservation, Inc., of Gentry, will be the featured speaker at Thursday’s Gentry Chamber of Commerce Awards Banquet to be held at 6 p.m., at the new Wooden Spoon Restaurant in Gentry.

Parker will speak at the event and share information on western Benton County history and the role the area played in the Civil War and the significance that history has for the area today, especially as it relates to the Heritage Trail project.

Parker is a sixth generation Arkansan and has worked in both fine and decorative art conservation for more than 36 years. Parker completed his undergraduate work at John Brown University in Siloam Springs and his graduate studies at the Smithsonian Institution’s furniture conservationtraining program in Suitland, Md., becoming a staff member in that program. He is a professional associate of the American Institute for Conservation and was the first conservator in private practice to be named as national president of the wooden artifacts group of the AIC.

Parker has lectured at numerous institutions, including the Smithsonian, M.I.T., Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities, Colonial Williamsburg and the Canadian Conservation Institute. He has also lectured and taught at numerous colleges and universities and regularly lectures at state and regional historical associations. He taught a special course at both John Brown University and at Northwest Arkansas Community College on the American Civil War, focusing on the guerilla warfare west of the Mississippi.

Parker has worked on objects from the White House, Monticello, MountVernon, The Hermitage, Biltmore, Beauvoir and numerous presidential libraries and collections.

Parker Conservation is one of only a handful of fine arts laboratories in the country that uses an in-house ultra-violet light microscope in conjunction with its treatment processes. The process is modeled after the microscope treatments used in the Sistine Chapel in Italy.

Annual awards will be presented at the banquet for volunteer and community service. Community awards to be presented include Outstanding Business Person of the Year, Outstanding Citizen, Rookie of the Year, Silver Citizen Award and Lifetime Achievement Awards.

Tickets are $20 each and seating is limited. For more information or tickets to the annual event, contact Chamber director Bev Saunders at 212 East Main Street, P.O. Box 642, Gentry, at 736-2358, or at info@ gentrychamber.com.

News, Pages 2 on 02/22/2012