MEETING OF MARCH 1, 2001 By Wyatt Allen
LOS ALTOS ROTARY CLUB - HAPPY 52ND ANNIVERSARY!
Pres. GINNY led our members in celebrating our 52nd anniversary. Although without her official bell, the new sound system made it much easier for GINNY to gain our attention. MARTY SPANGLER led the pledge and BILL REWAK offered his usual thorough provoking comments of the day.
President's Note: The new sound system was working this week, but we have not accepted the installation as completed, nor made the final payment. When all that occurs, we will then turn over the keys to the city, as a gift from Los Altos Rotary. (We paid 2/3, and the city paid 1/3 of the costs.) We will also learn to prepare each of our speakers with proper attachment of the microphone. If other adaptations need to be made, we will make them. Overall, it is a huge improvement.
We were joined by a large number of Mountain View Rotarians, our sponsoring club back in 1949, to help us celebrate our anniversary. Several members were a little apprehensive that the menu would possibly consist only of peanut butter sandwiches again, but evidently FRANK SCHUMANN wasn't aware of that "tradition." We congratulated Ed SCHNITKER for sixty years in Mountain View Rotary. WOW!
Comings & Goings:
BILLY RUSSELL was back looking as fit and full of vigor (and vitals after lunch). Welcome back, Billy, we missed you!
CURTIS COLE has informed GINNY that his duties with a new start-up in Redwood City will keep him from attending our club and has resigned. Good luck, CURTIS!
DENNIS YOUNG presented a "red badge" (nowadays it's a white badge with a red sticker) to our newest member, KURT MAHNKE, a local realtor. Make sure you go out of your way to welcome KURT to our club.Happenings:
22 members are already signed up for the District Conference in April. President elect FIROOZ (who is undergoing his training this weekend in preparation of his Rotary year) encouraged as many as 50 Los Altos Rotarians to join him at the conference.
CINDY LUEDTKE announced the return of our Cioppino Night scheduled for March 30 at 6:30 p.m. at the Garden House. The $35 per person cost is a bargain. Sign up early and start working on a hearty appetite. There is only room for about 125 of us.
PEGGY BUCHANAN was present to celebrate her big "5-0" but DICK DUHRING was away celebrating his 78th. Happy Birthday to both!
It was announced that JANE REED has competed a new brochure and application for our own Los Altos Rotary Endowment Fund. Get a hold of one and help others learn of what we support in the community and how to apply for funds for worthy projects.Comments From The Past (Presidents, that is):
DAN DUTTON evidently spent as much time with Mountain View Rotary as our club during his year as president. He was fined often and was even presented a bill for membership. He resisted returning the fining favor this time, however.
ROY LAVE eliminated the confusion as to when our club was actually chartered, or did he? Its not May as many thought, but March (5th to be exact). As DICK DUHRING had failed to raise the cultural level of our club, ROY failed to get us to add a fifth question to the Four Way Test, "Can we do it better?" The club provided a resounding "NO." Hey, how many left- over locomotive pins does ROY still have if he's offering to give them out to anyone joining GINNY's President's Club?
DICK BLANDING reminded us of the year of the "Baron" along with the grand entrance and CRES MCFALL's poem that included all members' last names. He presented the framed charter to GINNY to have it hanging on the wall at all meetings.
MARGE BRUNO was honored to be the first woman president of our club and begin Partners For Education, a real hands-on service project that has grown into an even larger effort today as Partners For A New Generation.FIROOZ GHAFFARI introduced our speaker, SUSANNE PARI. SUSANNE began her career as a journalist, but switched careers and became a writer of fiction because she could express her opinions without the necessary proof or verification. Her topic was "Politics & Religion - How Do They Mix?" Her immediate answer, "Very Badly!"
She is the author of The Fortune Catcher, a seven-year effort about the Islamic revolution in Iran as seem though family experiences and personal experiences since she has lived in both the United States and Iran. Her purpose in writing the book was to gain a personal understanding of the cause and events of the revolution, find a way to describe it to effectively to others, and to tell a good story. Based upon the excerpts she read, she accomplished all of her objectives. She could demonstrate to us in a few short paragraphs why the West in general, and the United States in particular, introduced changes that forced Iranians to give up or eliminate long-standing traditions and beliefs, all of which was greatly resented.SUSANNE warned us of the danger of fanatics and applauded Rotarians as more likely to speak up and stand up against fanatics due to our relative conservatism. She recognized Rotary as both non-political and non-religious in policy and practice. She felt this was both a rare and valuable attribute in today's world from her experiences elsewhere in the world.
President's Message "Have you asked someone today to join Rotary?" This is a question posed by RI President Frank Devlyn to the 1.2 million members of Rotary International in this month's issue of Rotarian magazine.
I will simply ask you to bring someone to Rotary next week. Offer an invitation to a friend or colleague to join you for lunch at your Rotary Club on Thursday, where there are interesting people, more than a little humor, and a speaker next week who is one of our own members, with a fascinating talk about "The Donner Party."
An invitation to join Rotary usually comes after someone has visited the club, seen who we are, what we do, and whether they respond positively to all of that. Do they see themselves as part of this club?
As President Frank states, "It's truly amazing that Rotary has grown from only four individuals in 1905 to more than one million members in 2001."
When I joined Rotary in 1990, Wyatt was the President I'll guess there were about 90 members. Now we are 128. We wouldn't trade any of those 38 new members. There are many fine people in our area that will be real assets to the fellowship and service that we enjoy each week."Rotary cannot meet the challenges of today's world without a solid base of enthusiastic, committed members." Bring just one person to Los Altos Rotary with you next week, or the week after that. By doing so, you will help us to…Create Awareness and Take Action.
See you Thursday,
GinnyPrograms
March
March 7 - Art Show Committee meeting. 8 a.m., Los Altos Sub-Acute Center,
809 Fremont Ave., Los Altos, Tracie Murray, Art Show Chair.
March 8 - Marlene Cowan, The Donner Party
March 15 - Elkus Youth Ranch
March 22 - John Giovanola, Hansen Cement Mfg.
March 29 – Dave Mooring, President, Rambus, Inc.
March 30 - Rotary Cioppino Night Dinner at Garden HouseApril
April 5 - Ted Lempert - EdVoice
April 6-8 - District Conference, Oakland
April 12 - Congresswoman Anna Eshoo
April 19 – Iwao Peter Sano – "1000 Days in Siberia"
April 26 – Partners For New Generations Day
April 27 - Rotary Social Golf Day and BBQ/Poker NightMay
May 3 - Ron Blatman - Cities That Live, Cities That Die
May 10 - George Estill - Travel
May 17 – Chuck Bull, RI Faces the Population Dilemma
May 19-20 -26th Annual Rotary Fine Art in the Park
May 31 – LARC Scholarship Awards DayJune
June 7 – Art Show Appreciation Day
June 14 – LAREF Annual Meeting
June 21 – Bob Hoffman, Cleaned up Mt. Everest
June 28 – Ginny's Kick-out, part 1
June 29 - LARC Kick-out, Dinner/Dance, Fremont Hills Country Club"Information in this newsletter is intended for the exclusive use of the members of the Rotary Club of Los Altos to facilitate the work of the club and to promote club fellowship. It is not to be used for any commercial or outside, unrelated, non-profit purposes. No publication of material in this newsletter should occur without the express permission of the club President or the Editor of the Rotator."
Copyright 2001 The Los Altos Rotary Club
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