Alison Lockhart A dentist for 26 years, Dr. Alison Lockhart was born in Augusta, but her parents lived on their farm in Barnwell County. Her parents still live on the farm, which is about 20 miles from the Savannah River Site, the federal nuclear compound popularly called The Bomb Plant when Lockhart was a kid. Her mother, mostly a full- time manager of the household, worked as a part- time employee at SRS.

Lockhart has an older sister, Susan James, in Columbia, who is in legal research. Her younger brother, John Wise, is an oil trader.

Lockhart went to kindergarten in Williston, S.C., and to Williston Elko Elementary School until she transferred to Jefferson Davis Academy for the third grade.

She stayed with Davis through high school graduation. She was a varsity cheerleader and an accomplished pianist. And as an accomplished student, Lockhart finished high school in three years.

Lockhart started college at USC Aiken intending to major in math, but she shifted to biology as part of her predentistry direction. Again, she finished a four- year program in three years.

While preparing herself for dental school, during the few months between finishing college and beginning dental school, she worked for her brother- in- law in a laboratory at the Albert B. Chandler Medical Center in Lexington, Ky.

Lockhart attended dental school at MUSC in Charleston, where she again finished ahead of schedule, this time by one semester. She married when she was a sophomore dental student, and moved to Columbia immediately after graduation.

From her first marriage, Lockhart has two daughters. Abby, 21, is a senior at the College of Charleston, where she is majoring in finance. Carrie, 23, is teaching English in Santiago, Chile. Carrie graduated from Clemson, devotcari ing her time there almost equally to economics and Spanish.

Lockhart met her second husband, Dave Soper, in the Virgin Islands, where he ran a water sports business. In Columbia, he entered the restaurant business as a chef. The two continue their water sports together, and they are serious sailors, certified as transoceanic types. Most recently, they took off in a rented 45' Jenneau sailboat.

Lockhart's dental practice is on Trenholm Road, near Trenholm Plaza. As an office for general dentistry, Lockhart's business sees about 35 to 40 patients a day. To help her handle that level of business, she has two receptionists, two assistants, three hygienists, and another dentist.

Her office is in her own building, a fully functional layout designed by Columbia's Allen Marshall.

Her advice to young dentists just entering the profession is to lock onto a mentor, someone long practiced who knows it all and who can tell it all, like Lockhart.