MEETING OF MARCH 8, 2001 By Cindy Luedtke
The inspiration was given by DON HULL prefaced with a contribution from his daughter, entitled "I Believe".
New CD artist RICK GLAZE led us in a song he wrote last summer that I appropriately have named "My Dot Com Done Me Wrong". For those of you who wish to reminisce about your own experiences this past year, here are the words;
My Dot Come done come and gone
The wheels came off and it didn't take long
All that venture capital's spent
And our website didn't even make a centThe club sends their best wishes to JOANNE KAVALARIS who is suffering at home with shingles and chronic fatigue. She is still managing to run things at work from home, which made a few ponder "How hard could banking be, then?" Let's talk, Joanne.
LUCY RASMUSSEN, a recently installed red badger, gave her five-minute talk. Lucy is a clinical biologist with the Center for Aids Research at Stanford. She was born in Texas on July 14, Bastille Day. This seemed to work well for her since Bastille Day is celebrated quite heartily in Texas. She is rightfully proud of her accomplishments over the years, from assisting victims of Hiroshima, her contribution in testing over 75,000 samples for Polio vaccine research when getting her masters at Baylor University and later obtaining her Doctoral degree in Pittsburgh, PN. In her 25 years with Stanford, she has been the principal investigator, studying a strain of herpes virus that ultimately causes blindness in its victims. She became involved with our Rotary Club after becoming familiar with Marlene Cowan and the Rotary Aids Project. She attended the 13th International Aids Conference held in Durban, South Africa and witnessed the effect of aids in that part of the world first-hand. We are fortunate to have a member with such an experienced background to become an important contributor to the next phase of the Rotary Aids Project. Welcome, Lucy.
MARY MARLEY announced the Los Altos Interact Club raised over $500 to help fund their Safe and Sober Program. Thank you to those in the club who supported their efforts by purchasing raffle tickets.
JOHN SYLVESTER, Director of Membership reminded everyone to keep in mind opportunities for bringing in members. It seems we have welcomed a lot of new members to our club recently. However, due to the high number of people moving out of the area, we are basically "holding our own". The process is easy: Bring a prospective member to at least three Rotary meetings. Complete a sponsorship and application for membership form. The board then approves or declines membership. Once board-approved, the candidate then attends an orientation meeting, is inducted into the club and attends red badge meetings.
Wyatt Allen, honored first-time and multiple Paul Harris Fellows. Congratulations go to first-time recipients JOHN MOSS, MONA ARMISTEAD, BELLA BERLY, KAREN FOX (yes, Karen, you are now a "Fellow"), and BILL WALTERS. Those members honored for multiple Paul Harris designations were BOB ADAMS PH + 2, MARGE BRUNO with PH + 1, PAUL NYBERG PH +1 and GINNY LEAR with PH + 3. Thank you for your ongoing support of Rotary International.
KAREN FOX will be departing for Russia on Wednesday, March 14. If you have any clothing to send along with her, you'll need to hurry!If you haven't already done so, clear your calendar for the Club's biggest fund-raising event, the Rotary Fine Art Show. The dates of the show are May 19 and 20 this year. It won't be long before you will be asked to sign up for your work shifts, so make sure you are available and ready to pitch in. Everyone's help is needed to continue to make this show a success every year. Proceeds from the show go to all types of great causes throughout our community as well as internationally, through the good work of the Los Altos Rotary Endowment Fund. Working at the art show is a good way to get to know your fellow Rotarians. Recruit your friends, neighbors, kids and spouse. Its an enjoyable time.
Before our featured speaker was introduced, there was just enough time to accept confessions. GINNY was outwardly disappointed that Dr. STEVE ANDERSON, now widely-known as the "Golden Snake", chose to be out of town for his birthday acknowledgment. SAM PESNER, being the good partner and friend that he is, attempted to remedy this major faux pas. He volunteered a $60.00 fine from Dr. Anderson on his behalf to be paid by Dr. Anderson at the nearest convenient time upon his return from the Four Seasons Hotel in Scottsdale, AZ. Hope you won a bet or two on the golf course, Steve. Happy "Big-time" Birthday to you!
JERRY TOMANEK admitted he will be having a birthday on Tuesday. He also admitted his comparative youthfulness to the Golden Snake by paying a $56.00 fine. Happy Birthday, Jerry. PEGGY BUCHANAN offered to join the President's Club in honor of her Father's birthday today.
The Donner Party
Our own MARLENE COWAN is a descendent of one of the survivors of the Donner Party. Elitha Donner was her great grandmother who turned 14 during the fateful trek across the country. George Donner, Marlene's great great grandfather was the chosen leader of the party. George was 62 years old when he sold his farm near Chicago, Ill. and started the trip, bringing along his third wife, Tamsen and his five girls, one of them Elitha. Other families joined them and they set off from Springfield, Illinois, in three wagons, joining many others on the Oregon Trail.Marlene told details of fatal mistakes made and just plain old rotten luck. The Donner Party split off with 20 wagons at the Hastings Cut-off in hopes of saving time. This was after toiling across a desert that turned out to be twice as long as anticipated and by that time, tensions were high. A fight involving John Reed ended up to be fatal for another member of the party. George died of gangrene after badly injuring himself with an axe when fixing a wheel axle. Warnings of a treacherous and difficult crossing went unheeded by the group.
Elitha was one of the 15 survivors who walked out of the infamous pass after hope of being rescued was lost. At the time, there were approximately 20,000 inhabitants in territories west of the Mississippi. Elitha, herself, told very few stories from the experience. It was a time of suffering and loss of her family, she really didn't want to recount. She did relate that one time she was almost kidnapped by an Indian brave. Stories of the Donner Party's misfortunes were sensationalized, especially in the East. This discouraged the westward movement for a couple of years until the discovery of gold in 1848 instilled the motivation in others to take the risk.Marlene closed by suggesting that perhaps some of us in the room may have some connection to the Donner Party ourselves. Dude, for instance is a descendent of a family who took Elitha into their home after her horrendous experience. Thank you Marlene for an interesting and informative talk.
There's still some room for the Cioppino Feed. But not much, so hurry and make your reservation. If you plan to attend, please write in your reservation at next week's meeting and bring a check for $35.00 per person, or call Cindy Luedtke or Steve Shepherd at 650-941-9300 to reserve a spot. Singles, friends, and guests are welcome. The event will begin at 6:30 PM at the Garden House on Friday, March 30. There will be a special guest appearance of that renowned Italian spinner of tales, Sammy Pesnerino, so don't miss it!
President's Message Following our meeting on Thursday, the board met to approve two membership applications. These prospective members will now have an orientation, after which their information will be published for club approval. Our thanks to their sponsors, Dick Henning and Gary Ross for taking the time to bring these people to Los Altos Rotary.
The Strategic Planning meeting we held in February demonstrated to us that there is no lack of good ideas for service in our community. This requires people and time. Both are available when we look around and see who else could join us in these new areas. We will be presenting ideas from the Planning meeting soon.
As Membership Director John Sylvester told us, so far this year, ten members have brought in eleven new members, and yet we are down three from where we began in July. People's interests or jobs change, or they move away. It is, therefore, important to continue to bring active new people into the club. Important also, for current members to look at new ways to be involved.
My thanks to all of you for your support and service, as we head into the final third of my year as your Club President. Our birthday celebration a week ago, with Mountain View Rotarians in attendance, and our wonderful presentation from Marlene Cowan this week, combine to make us all appreciate the quality of our members, and the fun and fellowship of our Rotary Club.
See you Thursday,
GinnyPrograms
March
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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