Speaker to discuss academy 'miracle'

PROVO — The Brigham Young Academy building went unnoticed for years as it suffered from neglect and battled the elements.

It took a strong, committed group of citizens to raise $5.3 million in private donations and pass a $16.8 million bond to renovate the building and bring it back to its glory days.

Doug Smoot, the great grandson of the Academy's administrator, Abraham O. Smoot, will present a lecture Thursday titled "The Miracle at Academy Square: The History and Process of the Preservation of the Brigham Young Academy Building." It will be in BYU's Harold B. Lee Library Auditorium at 3 p.m.

During the lecture, Smoot will describe the efforts to preserve the aging building and the referendum campaign that guaranteed its future.