MOUNT VERNON — Cornell College and the United Methodist Church will mark 150 years of a shared heritage and mission Sunday, March 21, during the 10:45 a.m. worship service at Mount Vernon United Methodist Church.

Gregory Palmer, bishop of the Iowa Conference of the United Methodist Church, will give the sermon, titled “All of the Above.” The Cornell Chamber Singers, directed by Lisa Hearne, will provide special music. Following the service will be a potluck dinner open to all.

Pastor Frank Seydel notes the service also will recognize members of the congregation associated with Cornell, including faculty, alumni, students and parents of students. “Those persons make up a substantial portion of our congregation,” he said.

The United Methodist Church has historically looked to colleges to help inform its members. Cornell was founded by Methodist minister George Bowman, who believed education was critical to a civilized society. In September 1853, classes began at Cornell — then called the Iowa Conference Seminary — in the old Methodist Episcopal Church because construction was not finished on the first academic building on the new 15-acre campus. During the college’s early history, the church aggressively helped recruit students.

Today six of Cornell’s 39 trustees represent the United Methodist Church, and the church supports the college financially and encourages its members to do so. The college and church remain committed to the joint mission of developing leaders with intelligence, compassion and willingness to serve others.

MOUNT VERNON — Select items from the Cornell College archives are making a rare public appearance in the Cole Library gallery as part of Cornell’s sesquicentennial celebration. This unusual exhibit is on view through March 31. A reception will be held from 3-4 p.m. Tuesday, March 23.

Among the artifacts are a men’s cheerleading uniform from 1929, oil portraits of legendary Cornell characters, a bust of William Fletcher King and a Dumpf Stumpf pin (find out more about it in the exhibit). In addition to many labeled photographs are the original skeleton keys to College Hall, a student desk from the early days of the college, leather-bound 19th-century student records, a Brown Bomber cartoon and a master plan for the campus that never came to fruition.

Many of these items have never been displayed before.

MOUNT VERNON — The Peabody Trio returns to Cornell College for a Music Mondays concert March 15 at 8 p.m. in King Chapel.

General admission is $8 at the door. This event, the last of four Music Mondays performances during the school year, is part of Cornell’s sesquicentennial celebration.

The Peabody Trio features pianist Seth Knopp, violinist Violaine Melançon and cellist Natasha Brofsky. The trio performed at Cornell in November 2001.

Their concert program will feature Mozart’s Trio in B-flat Major, K. 502; Alfred Schnittke’s Piano Trio (1985; 1992); and Tchaikovsky’s Piano Trio in A minor, Opus 50.

The Washington Post praises the Peabody Trio’s ability to bring “the romantic fervor of the early 20th-century greats” to every performance. The group has established itself as one of the foremost piano trios in the world after winning the prestigious Naumburg Chamber Music Award in 1989.

Since its New York debut in 1990 at Alice Tully Hall, the Peabody Trio has performed in many of the most important chamber music series in North America including the Kennedy Center, Washington, D.C., and the 92nd St. Y and Frick collection, New York. In addition, the group has toured Japan, Israel and Great Britain, and performed at the Tanglewood and Ravinia summer festivals. Trio members also serve as resident faculty members of the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore.

MOUNT VERNON — The lives of two prostitutes, two cops and the artist girlfriend of one become entwined in surprising ways in “Blue Surge,” a stage drama by University of Iowa graduate Rebecca Gilman that runs March 18 through 21 at Cornell College.

Performances are at 8 p.m. in Kimmel Theatre of Youngker Hall. Tickets are $8 for adults and $5 for seniors and non-Cornell students. To reserve tickets, call 895-4293.

Gilman earned an M.F.A. at Iowa in 1992. In 1998 she won the American Theater Critics’ Association Osborn Award for her play about serial killers, “The Glory of Living.”

“Blue Surge” focuses on two police detectives who become romantically involved with women they meet while attempting to bust a prostitution ring. Gilman’s story examines the role that class and background can play in shaping an individual’s values and expectations.

“Rebecca Gilman has an unerring ear for the ways mismatched people relate, an open heart for the ways they louse things up,” writes Peter Rainer in New York Magazine.

The Cornell production is directed by Ron Clark, artistic director at Riverside Theatre in Iowa City and artist in residence in Cornell’s department of theatre and communications studies.

MOUNT VERNON — Cornell College will be featured in “Colleges of Distinction,” a new college guide profiling some of America’s best bets in higher education. Based on the opinions of guidance counselors, educators and admissions professionals, “Colleges of Distinction” honors colleges that excel in key areas of educational quality.

In order to qualify for inclusion, Cornell was evaluated for its performance in the “four distinctions”: engaged students, great teaching, vibrant communities and successful outcomes.

Cornell will be extensively profiled with other colleges in the forthcoming book, “Colleges of Distinction,” which will be published this year. The colleges are also featured on the Web.

College seekers can visit the site to learn more about the colleges, read tips from high school guidance counselors and essays from college students, presidents and other members of different campus communities.

The colleges and universities listed in the guide include schools from every area of the country. Their average student-faculty ratio is 13:1, and most have an average class size of around 20. The schools vary in size from universities of 7,000 to small liberal arts colleges of 1,000 or fewer students.

MOUNT VERNON — Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author Bob Woodward will deliver Cornell College’s inaugural Delta Phi Rho Lecture on Thursday, March 11, at 7 p.m. in King Chapel. Admission is free.

The lecture, “Bush at War,” is also the title of Woodward’s best-selling 2002 book, which examines the Bush administration’s actions in the 100 days following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Woodward will sign books at a reception in Cole Library following the lecture.

Woodward is an assistant managing editor of the Washington Post, where he has worked for 33 years. He was the lead reporter for the Post’s Pulitzer-winning articles on the aftermath of 9/11. “Bush at War” focuses on the three months following the terrorist attacks, during which the United States prepared for war in Afghanistan, took steps toward deploying forces in Iraq, intensified homeland defense and began a well-funded CIA covert war against terrorism around the world. Using inside access to the major players, Woodward offers a nearly day-by-day account of the decision-making processes and power battles behind the headlines.

The Post received the Pulitzer in 1973 for reporting by Woodward and Carl Bernstein on the Watergate scandal, which became the best-selling “All the President’s Men.” Woodward has co-authored or authored more No. 1 national best-selling nonfiction works than any other contemporary American writer, including three additional books on the presidency (”The Final Days,” “The Agenda: Inside the Clinton White House” and ” Shadow: Five Presidents and the Legacy of Watergate”).

His other No. 1 national best sellers are “The Brethren: Inside the Supreme Court,” “Wired: The Short Life and Fast Times of John Belushi,” “Veil: The Secret Wars of the CIA 1981-1987″ and “The Commanders,” on the first Bush administration and the Gulf War. Woodward is also author of national best sellers on the presidential campaign, “The Choice,” and Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, “Maestro.”

Woodward graduated from Yale University and served five years as a communications officer in the U.S. Navy before beginning his journalism career at the Montgomery County (Md.) Sentinel, where he was a reporter for one year before joining the Post.

The lecture is funded by the Delta Phi Rho Centennial Endowment. In anticipation of the 1998 Delt Centennial, a group of early 1960s Delt alumni conceived of the endowment to finance a major lecture series on campus. After committing $150,000 themselves, the group single-handedly campaigned to raise a total of $400,000 from Delt alumni. The purpose of the endowment is to contribute to the intellectual capital of the college and the community by bringing to campus, approximately every other year, a nationally prominent figure to interpret current issues and encourage student and faculty involvement in public affairs.

MOUNT VERNON — Cornell College will be recognized for 150 years of higher education when the Iowa Legislature honors the college Tuesday, March 9, at the Capitol in Des Moines.

Beginning at 8:30 a.m. in the Senate chambers, college chaplain Catherine Quehl-Engel will lead the prayer, a resolution honoring Cornell will be read and President Les Garner will make brief remarks on behalf of the college. At 8:45 a.m. the activities will be repeated in the House.

At noon in the Capitol rotunda, the Cornell Concert Choir will give a 20-minute performance.

Founded in 1853, Cornell is celebrating its sesquicentennial during the 2003-2004 school year.