A retired U.S. military officer and former prisoner of war will speak about overcoming adversity at 11:30 a.m. Friday, Oct. 25, in Room G-11 of the West VirginiaUniversityLifeSciencesBuilding.

Retired Air Force Col. Edward L. Hubbles motivational speech will be”Human Potential Is a State of Mind.”The talk, sponsored by the Edward Jones financial services company in conjunction with WVU s College of Business and Economics, is open to the public.

Hubble served 28 years in the military and earned more than 60 commendations and service medals. He spent 6½ years as a POW during the Vietnam War, and the lessons of survival he learned during captivity are the foundation on which he has built his philosophy for living.

Today, Hubble is an accomplished artist and author of”Escape from the Box: The Wonder of Human Potential,”first published in 1994. He holds five college degrees.

His visit to Morgantown is part of an ongoing community service program that takes him throughout North America to recount his POW experiences and deliver his message that anything is possible with a positive, focused state of mind.

Edward Jones, which is sponsoring the lecture tour, is the largest financial services company in the nation, with more than 7,000 branch and affiliated offices in the United States, including Morgantown, Canada and the United Kingdom.