SPOKES VOL. LXV NO. 14 October 2, 2018
Steve Larsen and Scott Mark were our greeters this morning.
President Mark Odland opened today’s meeting with the Pledge of Allegiance and Art provided an invocation including our prayers for Julie Weber, Missy Thompson, Don Hixson and Jim Davis who returns to us after a medical emergency this weekend.
Guests:
We hosted Tim Davis, Jim’s son this morning. He provided a short lesson in speaking Minnesota English.
Announcements:
- We received thank you note from the Dan Seibert campaign.
- We are invited to the opening of a new event center opening on October 4th at 5:00.
- Art Ayers reported that our friend John Gillette is home from rehab and is feeling 100% after his stroke.
Songs:
Our first song was the 1905 hit “In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree” which interestingly, has the meter of its chorus is in the form of a Limerick.The 1906 Broadway musical “Forty-Five Minutes from Broadway” is the source of our second song, “Mary’s a Grand Old Name”.Conductor Bob Boerma was very pleased with our performance, especially in front of one of his former students. Tim Davis.At Bob’s insistence, we belted out the Rotary version of “When the Saints Go Marching In” as our final song.
50/50
Ted Weber decided that he has given the rest of us enough chances to win the pot so he pulled the winning ticket out of his pocket and then casually drew the four. He donated his winnings back to the club – Thanks Ted! Jean Stein held the $2 ticket.
Fines:
- Nick Tuit celebrated his grandson’s birthday.
- Art Ayer’s son is celebrating his 33rd birthday this week.
- We sang our famous Ludington style birthday song.
- Tom Reusink showed us the Hemmings catalog of parts for old cars and a couple of other publications about antique cars.
- Steve Larsen and his insurance agent were glad that his sone is beginning drivers training.
- Jim Davis was pleased to be with us today.
- Tom Fleming was pleased to announce that Big 10 Tuesday has commenced and you can save $.10 a gallon on gas from now through basketball season.
- Art Bolt is attending his last South Haven meeting for the year as he heads to Florida this week.
- Jeff Melvin announced that he and his wife are moving to Grass Lake at the end of the month. He will be missed by our club and we wish him well.
- Don Hodgman, just back from a trip to Scandinavia, highly recommended the trip, especially Norway.
- Tom Noverr just returned from a bike trip to Dorr County Wisconsin.
- Tony Martorano still seems surprised that Da Bears are still in first place in the NFL Central Division.
President Odland opened our Club Assembly
He began with a few financial updates, including the fact that 100% of our membership contributes to the Rotary Foundation and Polio Plus. We will give about $5,000 to these organizations this year.
Bob Straits reported that we have made nearly $20,000 at our two pancake breakfasts this summer, slightly below our totals for three breakfasts last year but we will more than make up for that with the Haven Harvest event later this month.
A sign-up sheet for working the Haven Harvest is being passed around this week and next.
Mark also talked about keeping up the effort to publicize the work we do in our community, especially the work of Tom Renner.
Mark reviewed our membership records talking about how we had 58 members a few years ago to our current 49. While much of this drop was the cleansing of our records, not all were in this category. He showed several pictures of awards/checks we have presented and suggested that there were potential members in those pictures. Mark then turned the chair over to our membership committee, Dan Thompson and Steve Larsen.
Dan talked about the tons of resources available to clubs to help with membership and that all clubs are facing the same problem as membership has flattened all over the US. Our problems are common: Older members and busy young people, but we have to find a way to combat these obstacles.
We have to investigate our potential “pools” of candidates: Chamber of Commerce, friends, terminated members, youth groups, and the possibility of a satellite club, and other out of the box ideas.
It is important that everyone be involved every day, every year.
This is a long term plan and project, not a one-time shot and takes work as we typically lose 10% of our membership each year which means we need to replace five members just to stay even and even more if we hope to grow.
President Odland closed the meeting with the Four Way Test
Next week’s program: Bob Stickland will introduce South Haven City Manager Brian Dissette
Next week’s Greeters: Dan Liehr and Larry Wittkop
Editarian: Dene Hadden