Contact: Public Relations
(863) 680-4118

FSC honors United Methodist couple
Scholarship fund will be named for
Bishop James Knox and Edith Knox

LAKELAND, Fla. (Feb. 25, 2002) - Florida Southern honors Bishop James Lloyd and Edith Knox during a scholarship endowment dinner March 8 from 6 to 9 p.m. in the Hollis Wellness Center gymnasium on campus. The event is hosted by the United Methodist Higher Education Foundation (UMHEF), The Florida United Methodist Foundation, and Florida Southern College. The $100-per-plate dinner will endow a Foundation scholarship fund named for Bishop and Mrs. Knox for United Methodist (UM) students at Florida Southern College.

The dinner is being held in conjunction with the UMHEF Board of Trustees meeting at FSC March 7, 8, and 9. A national foundation based in Nashville, Tenn., the UMHEF is a 37-year-old organization dedicated to helping students achieve their dreams. UMHEF provides scholarship aid for UM students attending the 124 United Methodist-related institutions. Bishop and Mrs. Knox were selected as the honorees for the 2002 event because of recent service to the Florida Conference, active participation on the Board of Trustees of Florida Southern College, and a lifetime of distinguished service to The United Methodist Church.

James Lloyd Knox, a Florida native born in Tampa, has spent most of his life serving the United Methodist Church, in the episcopacy, as a superintendent, as a missionary, and in congregations throughout Florida, including churches in Dover, Tampa, West Palm Beach, and St. Petersburg.

Bishop Knox graduated from Florida Southern College in 1951, the same year he married his wife, Edith Laney Strawn of Dunedin. He went on to earn his divinity degree at the Candler School of Theology at Emory University in Atlanta. The couple journeyed as missionaries to Cuba and Argentina between 1958 and 1964, and in Florida, Bishop Knox served as coordinator of the Florida Spanish Ministry and superintendent of the DeLand and Miami Districts.

With his election to the episcopacy in 1984, Bishop Knox was assigned to the Birmingham Episcopal Area, covering the Alabama, West Florida, and North Alabama Conferences. In 1992 he was appointed to the North Georgia Conference. As a member of the General Board of Global Ministries, he served as president of the World Division from 1988 to 1992. He has also served on several college boards of trustees including Florida Southern, Emory University, Clark Atlanta University, and Bethune Cookman College, and has received honorary doctorates from Florida Southern and Bethune Cookman. He retired as a bishop in 1996, but due to Bishop Henderson's illness and death, he returned as Florida Conference Bishop in 1999 and later in 2000 and 2001.

Edith Knox attended Tulane University and received her nursing diploma from Mather School of Nursing, Southern Baptist Hospital in New Orleans. She worked as a registered nurse at Emory University Hospital as well as in Louisiana, Florida, and Cuba. She also ran a clinic in Santiago de las Vegas, Cuba, and supervised the outpatient clinic of the Student Health Center at the University of Miami.

The Knoxes, who live in St. Petersburg, Fla., celebrated their fiftieth wedding anniversary in June. They have two children, Richard Michael of Gainesville, and Carol Anne of Tallahassee.

For reservation information and other details on the Knox Scholarship Endowment dinner, contact Kitty Carpenter, FSC director of church relations at (863) 680-6211.

About Florida Southern College
Florida Southern is a four-year, private, co-educational liberal arts college affiliated with the United Methodist Church. The college offers more than 40 undergraduate majors and a master of business administration degree accredited by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. Located in Lakeland, Fla., the college is home to the largest, single-site collection of Frank Lloyd Wright architecture in the world.

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