Meeting Recap 9/18

There were 34 members in attendance as well as two visiting Rotarians and two guests.  The visiting Rotarians were Penny Fields from Highland Park and Arnie Klein from the Wilmette Noon club.  The guests were former member Roberta Rubin, who owned the Book Stall at Chestnut Court for many years; she was the guest of David Birkenstein. Our other guest was Brian Schmisek a Winnetka resident and an administrator and professor at Loyola University; he was brought by Wes Baumann.

 

President’s Comments:  Ellen Young, our District Governor, will be joining us on October 2 for her official visit to our club.  Preceding our regular meeting she will meet with the officers and board of directors at 10:30 a.m.    Our president participated in the Glenview Sunrise’s 5K run.  We were proud to learn that he finished in second place for his age group, until he confessed that there were only two in his age group.    Bob also reminded the Club that it is important that we all keep alert for potential new members.    Our program, in cooperation with the Volunteer Center to honor our local fire and police departments was a big success.  Bob mentioned that we received a nice thank you note from Northfield Police Chief, Bill Lustig.  The Club’s thanks go out to our community service leaders Barb Tubekis and Kristen Leahy.

 

Rich Lalley said that our club has raised $4000 for Operation Warm, enough to buy over 200 coats, and we still have over two more months to collect contributions for this project to provide new warm coats for children whose families are struggling financially.  Last year our club supplied over 700 coats so we do have a way to go.    Marie Kuipers is still looking for members to volunteer to serve on one of the Club’s numerous committees.    Jeanne Beckman returned after an extended absence and said she plans to return to chair the Literacy Committee.    Patti Van Cleave extended an invitation from Lori Dillon, our September 4^th speaker, to attend a reception on October 5^th in Lake Forest for Eric Peasah from Ghana, the head of Right to be Free, a NGO that is fighting human trafficking in Ghana. 

 

Tim McCabe and Fred Schwimmer celebrated their 5^th and 2^nd club anniversaries.  Happy Buck$ this week came from Mark Kotz, Fred Schwimmer and Tom Nash.

 

Our speaker for the day was Richard Davidson, an author and publisher.  He spoke on how life is full of the unexpected and how your life is a result of the decisions you made both expected and unexpected.  Dick gave a brief autobiography to use himself as an example of what he was talking about.  He was an engineering graduate from MIT with not much self-confidence due to not graduating in the top half of his class.  It was not until he was working as an engineer for Bell & Howell with their filmstrip projectors that he realized how well prepared he really was.  He eventually went into business for himself.  After retirement he became interested in writing.  Dick is a Past President of the Off-Campus Writers' Workshop, the oldest ongoing writers' group in the U.S.  He loved Agatha Christie mysteries and so he decided to write a mystery.  He has written a five volume mystery series based on the petitions in the Lord’s Prayer.  Dick said his goal was to write 20 books before his last breath.  He has written at least one novel each year since 2009.  His ‘loving’ son told him to slow down.