Debi Genthe, the Executive Director of Meals at Home, will discuss how the organization delivers nutritional meals to the North Shore. People who are unable to care for their nutritional needs like the elderly, homebound, and disabled are cared for by this wonderful organization. They can also furnish meals that are medically prescribed diets, and offer other supportive services. Our Rotary Club looks forward to hearing from this longtime North Shore organization. - See more at: http://wnrotary.org/Speakers#sthash.FTSz53NO.dpuf
There were 30 members in attendance this week and for the second week we had no guests. President Bob Baker announced that we were honoring Mike Malloy for a Paul Harris Fellowship. He was given a certificate and a Paul Harris pin. Bob also announced that the installation dinner of the new officers for the 2015-16 Rotary year would be held on June 11th at 5:30 p.m. at the Community House. John Thomas thanked the club for the great showing at this year’s benefit, which netted approximately $7000 for our charitable foundation. John said the original number of guest they were planning for was 60, that number was upped a couple of times and 85 actually showed up. It was a tremendous job performed by the benefit committee who planned and produced the event!
The District 6440 Humanitarian Patriot Awards are to be presented on June 12th at 7:00 p.m. A social hour with heavy hors d’oeuvres will precede the awards ceremony at 6:00 p.m. The event will honor support for the United States Armed Forces Veterans and their families. The event will be held at Rosiland Franklin University in North Chicago and is sponsored by the Rotary Club of North Chicago
We celebrated the Rotary anniversaries of Connie Berman( 13th), Tom Evans, (6th) and Greg Skirving (1st) as well as celebrating the 80th birthday of Fred Schwimmer. Bob Smith contributed the only Happy Buck.
The speaker for the day was astrophysicist, Dr. Alan Zablocki, who graciously filled in for the scheduled speaker, courtesy of Marie Kuipers. Alan’s return was “Everything about the Universe- Part Deux.” As a good teacher Alan reviewed some of the points he made in his April presentation. He reminded us that there are about 300 million galaxies. The Hubble telescope is now 25 years old and it has an estimated 3–5 years of useful life left. The next telescope for studying the galaxies is the James Webb Space Telescope. This telescope will be almost three times larger and because of its size the mirror has to be folded to fit inside of a rocket, which has never been done before. Also a new larger rocket must be developed. This new telescope will take pictures in infra-red whereas the Hubble can only use visible light. Alan also reported that there is significant espionage involved with these high-powered telescopes.
Alan remarked that it is so much easier to build telescopes high on mountaintops above much of the earth’s atmosphere, frequently two or three are built as a team of telescopes. There still is the problem of the distortion caused by what atmosphere exists.
Dr. Zablocki also spoke about the cameras that are used and showed some photos that are used to document what the telescopes see. In addition to the more traditional light cameras they now have a 570-mega-pixel dark energy camera. It is like having a camera composed of 64 iPhones. Ordinary matter (atoms) makes up only 5% of the universe while dark energy makes up 68% of the universe. We know that the universe is 13.8 billion years old, it is expanding and the rate of expansion is accelerating. Another interesting fact is the third component of the universe is dark matter. Dark matter does not shine or reflect light but it does have gravitational force. There is five times more dark matter than ordinary matter, but we still know very little about it.
One of the coolest pictures in Alan’s presentation was that of the Smiley Face galaxy, which is really two large galaxies with immense gravity that bends light of nearby galaxies. This bent light forms the outline of the face and the mouth.
The 2014-15 Rotary Year is nearly over, and our club has accomplished much. Our members are engaged; our Operation Warm, Kids Against Hunger and Community Grants programs were all great successes. We supported many fine local and international non-profits and just held another successful and very fun fundraising dinner to support our Community Grants fund for next year. We have much to be proud about our club, and about being a part of the greater fellowship of Rotary.
One goal we have yet to reach is our contributions to the Annual Program Fund of The Rotary Foundation. Through May 21, 15 of 60 members of our club have contributed $5,630 to The Rotary Foundation's Annual Programs Fund, or 92% of the $100 per member goal set by President Bob and our board. We thank these 15 Rotarians for already making their annual contribution, especially those in bold who are Paul Harris Fellows:
Wes Baumann, Tom Evans, Dave Gotaas, David Grant*,Mark Kotz, Marie Kuipers+, Rich Lalley+, Mike Malloy+, Bernie Michna, Rodger Morris*, Chuck Norton, Keith Reed, Mike Shelton, John Thomas and Patti Van Cleave.
* signifies a Major Donor. + signifies Paul Harris Society ($1,000 per year)
There are many reasons to give to the The Rotary Foundation:
Contributions support humanitarian and educational projects initiated and run by Rotary Clubs and Districts in six areas of focus- Disease prevention and treatment, maternal & child health, education & literacy, water and sanitation, economic & community development and peace & conflict resolution. Learn more by reviewing the Foundation’s annual report.
Contributions come back to support projects of our club's projects, like our coats for kids, Kids Against Hunger and International grants projects like the water well project we helped fund for an orphanage in Kenya and the digital x-ray/community health clinic project organized by District 6440. This year, we received nearly $4,000 for our Kids Against Hunger project! But we must give to receive.
Giving to The Rotary Foundation is an easy way for you to participate in Rotary’s service work beyond our club, providing you a personal connection to this great organization and the good it does throughout the world.
It’s easy to give. You can donate with a check or credit card at lunch; you can send a check to “WNRCF” (mark TRF in the memo line) to our club at 620 Lincoln Ave, Winnetka; you can donate via PayPal by clicking here, or you can donate directly to The Rotary Foundation at www.rotary.org or by calling 866-976-8279. One very convenient way to give is by making a recurring monthly gift on your credit card, which you can set up on Rotary’s website.
If you have any questions about The Rotary Foundation or how to give, contact Rich Lalley.
Please find a substitute if you are unable to fulfill your assignment; Just call or e-mail a fellow member and ask him/her to sub. Tom Evans - tom.evans527@gmail.com- who chairs the service committee, will confirm assignments. Sgt. at arms helps set up and store our stuff, please come 15 minutes early and be prepared to stay a few minutes after the meeting; Greeter greets and announces names of visiting Rotarians and guests; Thought of the Day can be spontaneous or read from a script; Dig 'n Grin can make us laugh or think seriously.
