DIGITAL EDITION No. 312 April 10, 2019  EDITOR: Kris Anderson PHOTOGRAPHER: Nicole Le PUBLISHER: Richard Lazovick

Our Program For Wednesday, April 17, 2019

Education, Food, and Farming in Sonoma County

Benjamin Goldstein

The SRJC Dean of Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Culinary Arts, Benjamin Goldstein, will discuss the role of higher education in supporting the dynamic agriculture, wine, and culinary industries in Sonoma County. Benjamin will also outline some bold ideas for the future and opportunities for the community to get involved in supporting SRJC Agriculture and Culinary Arts programs.

UPCOMING SOCIALS

Aug. 19-26, 2019 – Rotary Rhine River Cruise
The cruise is sold out. Those still interested may place their names on a waiting list.
                 Click here  for pricing, itinerary, etc.
                 Click here for flyer.
                 For more information contact Eva Atkin.

USEFUL LINKS

Visit our district at: http://www.rotary5130.org
Check out Rotary International at: http://www.rotary.org
Come see us at: http://rotarymeansbusiness

Opening Ceremonies:

Pledge of Allegiance: Rio Ray

Reflection:  Chip Rawson on “Making an Effort.”

Visiting Rotarians:

Barb Spangler from Valley of the Moon and our District Governor.  Barbara Beedon, past president of our club and a member of the Sebastopol club

Guests:

Noor and Chad Maxwell, who will become members next week and JC Sun who will become a member on May 15th!

Sunshine Report:

Mary Graves fell and broke her hip!  Kim Graves son is doing much better since his appendix ruptured.

Raffle:

Cecil Humes ran the raffle today. I think it was Joel Desilva with the right number, but pulled the wrong marble.

Announcements:

  1. Register now for the District Conference in Reno!
  2. The Rohnert Park Cotati club is going to start a satellite evening club. If you know anyone that would be interested, contact Wulff Reinhold.
  3. Rich de Lambert needs about 10 more people to sign up to work the Tomales Bay rest stop for Petaluma’s Bike Ride on May 18th. If you are not going to District Conference, please consider signing up to help.
  4. Ray Giampaoli says we are half way to our $50,000 goal for sponsorships of the Giro Bello
  5. Debi Zaft recognized the club members that went to District Assembly last Saturday morning. A copy of a new ad was posted for member to review.
  6. Pete Lescure is looking for people to sign up for the fellowship assignments at the meeting(s).

Rotarian of the Month:

Mark Burchill is our Rotarian of the month.  Mark has single handedly reorganized our storage locker.  He is also the club historian.  Thanks Mark, for all that you do for the club!

Past President’s Day, Hosted by Past President Julia Parranto

Including Julia, we had 16 past presidents with us today.  Julia asked them to talk about something(s) that happened during their year that they really haven’t talked about before…..or tell a joke.

Will Haymaker was first.  Will has always started his meetings with a hearty, “Aloha!”  Where did this come from?  It came from PETS, the president elect’s training course that all incoming presidents must attend.  In his case there was a group from Maui.  They were always laughing and had a good time.  Will wanted to copy that good feeling and so started his meetings with the Hawaiian greeting.

Norm Owen remembers the work our club did at Howarth Park. We raised a lot of money to build the entrance and the children’s play area.

Debi Zaft asked club members to send postcards to her when we were traveling.  She got some very funny cards.  One memorable on came from John Brown.

Jeanne Levin went to the international convention in Indianapolis, IN.  They found a martini bar down the street from their hotel and spent a lot of time there!  She also said that was the year club secretary (for about 25 years) Lou Robb died.  With his death went a lot of knowledge.  Lou knew how to do things no one else knew.  This was a problem!  She also wore a chees hat from Wisconsin for a $100 donation to the club.

Mark Burchill and the other local incoming Presidents he met at PETS decided to meet once a month for moral support.

Rich de Lambert was president at the start of the Polio Plus campaign and the introduction of women to Rotary.  Sharon Wright and Dorothy Hutchinson were our first woman members.

Charlie Howard-Gibbons was not a past president of our club.  He was president of East Oakland.  He encouraged hands on projects.  When they did the Rebuild Together project that year, 25 of the 30 members were there to help that day.

Doug Johnson interviewed lots of past presidents before he took over the job.  The sad thing that happened that year was the death of Nick Knickerbocker, our flying ace.  Jack Abercrombie, another indispensable club secretary, was out because of pneumonia.

Barbara Beedon had the unfortunate term of president during a financially trying time.  She kept us a float.  She will never forget going to the international convention in Australia.  She probably did have one of the best debunking’s ever

Dan Balfe was president of the Cambria chapter before moving to Sonoma county.  He organized Saturday clean ups on Highway 101.  That club called debunking’s “step downs.”  His whole family showed up. They had his head photocopied on Superman’s body for some of the decorations.

Fred Levin remembered helping members who were having some tough times financially during the recession.  We lost no club members that year.  Fred also had a joke…..A Rotarian went to see his dad at the nursing home.  When he got there the nurse was mixing up some hot chocolate with Viagra.  He asked the nurse why the combination. She said, “The hot chocolate helps him sleep. The Viagra keeps him from falling out of the bed.”

Joel Desilva changed our purchasing of a sheep and hog at the fair to a money-making event.  Previously we just bought the animals and that was it.  Now we were butchering them packaging the meat, having a BBQ and then auctioning of the rest. 

Steve Olson was president during the time Lou Robb was secretary.  Steve could not go to convention without missing his daughter’s graduation form high school.  The club sent Lou Robb, instead, for all his years of service.  Steve misses the fines.  He had everyone reporting back to him the little things in life of their fellow Rotarians.  Sometimes he even called member’s wives for information!  Stan Lance used to lead the club in a song at many meetings.  Lastly, the club foundation was started and had about $5000 in its corpus.  Now it is up to $1,700,000!

Chuck Barley was our oldest past president today, 1967-68.  Back then the club had over 200 members.  They could get lots of good speakers due to our size.

Yale Abrams misses Ray Dorfman, another past president.  Yale loved to fine Ray for anything and everything.  Ray was such a good sport.  Yes, we do miss Ray.

Jose Guillen was supposed to be president a year earlier, but a county project was about to start so he swapped years with Doug Johnson.  Doug went to Brazil for convention and came back with the idea for the NewGen project.  Jose stated, “You never remember what a person says, but you will always remember how they made you feel.”  This was also the year long time sergeant of arms; jack Geary could no longer do the job.  Sometimes he pitched in.  Dr Shari arranged for an intern to help.

Julia Parranto never would have thought her year would be consumed by fire.  But Rotarians rose up and helped raise $150,000.  She called our fire survivor members to check in on them.  One person was particularly touched that she reached out to see if they were ok and to ask if they needed anything.

 

Membership

Chad and Nour Maxwell have been approved for membership by the Board of Directors and have recently completed Rotary Information.

In addition, Ji Chao Sun (aka JC Sun) has also been approved for membership by the Board of Directors and has also recently completed Rotary Information.  JC is a Rotarian from the Rotary Club of Fremont.

Governor, District 5130

Barb Spangler, Valley of the Moon Rotary Club

 

 

 

 

Attendance Secretary

Debi Zaft P.O. Box 505 Santa Rosa, CA 95402

Board of Directors

Club Service I, Membership, Ryan Thomas
Club Service II, Club Meetings, Jeff Kolin
Club Service III, Fundraising, Steve Baime
Club Service IV, Member Activities, Anne Gospe
Club Service V, Information Technology and Records, Brandon Urich
Community Service I, Member Involvement, Andrea Geary
Community Service II, Youth, Laura Held
Vocational Service, Carolyn Fassi
International Service, Peter Holewinski