Rotary Club of Santa Monica

"2001/2002 - A Rotary Odyssey"

Rota-Monica

This Friday Evening Is Our Gala Party!

            How time flies! Eighty years ago our Rotary Club was created. Relive that ‘20s era of flappers and prohibition on Friday evening, February 1 at our Club’s 80th birthday celebration. We’re going to capture some of the fun and festivities of a time when Charleston marathons and raccoon coats were all the rage! Alarming numbers of American women smoked and swore. Imagine! Men wore argyle socks and coveted hip flasks. Surely none of our members.

             This classy event, bound to be the talk of Santa Monica society, takes place at the snazzy Casa del Mar Hotel on the beach. The reception begins at 6:15 p.m. An elegant dinner by candlelight will be served at 7:15 p.m. Our black and white decor will transform the Colonnade Room into an exciting ‘20s nightclub. You won’t have to knock three times to enter, but once you are inside, we promise magical entertainment, good company and memorable surprises.

             Remember, the regal Rotary Club opens at 6:15 p.m. with a no-host cocktail reception. Check in with Barbara when you arrive. Then at the door, guys pick up your boutonnieres and dolls, put on your pearls and get ready to party!

SAUSAGES?  DINOSAURS? OUR CLUBS GET INVOLVED

            In the town of Yoakum, Texas, the 50-member club thought of a fund-raising activity that seemed worth trying:  a “sausage supper” served in the community center.  The club tried it, and found that it worked.  About 850 people came and paid for suppers served by Rotarians.  That was 23 years ago.  Since then, twice every year, the club has staged the same event.  That’s all it needs to cover its budget, which includes club expenses and handsome donations to various charities in Yoakum and elsewhere.  Read about it on page 47 of the January Rotarian magazine.

            The magazine also tells of challenging projects achieved by other clubs.  For example, in California’s Antelope Valley (a desert area that most of us have driven through) the Rotary Club of Lancaster West decided that everyone thereabouts would like to see life-size replicas of a few dozen monsters that dwelt in the valley in primeval times.  It talked the idea over with the local school heads and the Lancaster municipal government.  They combined to put together “Dinosaurs in the Desert”, the biggest educational show ever unveiled in the valley.  It attracted 37,000 visitors, including 18,749 school kids, who got to see it free.  (There were 608 tours organized by 111 schools.)

            Also in the magazine, you can read about why the Rotary Club of Lansing, Michigan, donated $50,000 to the local zoo:  it found that in any medical emergency, the zoo had to transport animals needing surgery to other locations.  So the club paid to create an adjunct to the zoo:  a hospital and surgical center, with glass walls through which visitors could watch animals being treated.

            On page 46 you can read about what the club in Canada’s Bridgewater, Nova Scotia, did when it learned that hundreds of poor people in Guyana were losing teeth because they couldn’t afford dental treatment.  It lined up a dental team of three Rotarians who spent 12 days moving from village to village, making fillings and extracting rotted teeth.

            A neighboring club in Guelph Trillium, Ontario, decided to try to pull kids off the streets in Nepal, India.  It established an orphanage there.  To support it, it planned a Ribfest and began preparing nine months ahead.  Now it has staged Ribfests yearly for three years in what it calls Ribberside Park, and raised $110,000.  Two other Ontario clubs picked up the idea successfully.  One, in Burlington, has raised $450,000, of which it used a large part to build and operate a hospice.

SEVENTEEN SPECIAL ROTARIANS YIELD = $1,730

Total taxes assessed through January 11:  $21,50l.

Jim Haljun made a trip to Hawaii.  This cost him $100 in what was called an Aloha Tax. We needn’t wait for someone to do something before taxing him.  We can extract money for what he is expected to do later.  For example, Dick Lawrence was “performance taxed” for the fine work we knew he would do as program chairman of the YMCA open house. 

For going to his 55th high school reunion, Jim Reidy was taxed $105.

For being featured in a news article as our first woman president (which she will become in 2003) Dee Menzies was charged $100.

It cost the following Rotarians $100 each to be shown in a newspaper picture supporting the Boys and Girls Club Dinner Auction:  Bob Sullivan, John McIntire, Allan Young, Spryos Dellaportas and Paul Leoni.

It was even more expensive for Stanley Shu to “follow the Rotary code of service above self and the four-way test” in dealing with the president of the Malibu Rotary Club, Dr. John Elman.  Stan paid $125.

Seven past presidents of our club who have done fine (in both senses) in helping steer the Santa Monica Rotary Club were recognized at $100 each:  John Bohn, Jim Cayton, Nat Charnley, Bob Fredericks, Bill Fritzsche, Jack Michel and Dick Rice.

                                                                                               -- Lionel Ruhman

WE WERE HAPPY TO SEE THEM

            Honored guests of club members at the January 11 or January 18 meetings were Oded Wolf, Josh Needle, Ronald Wilkes, Greg Naylor, Marlena Naylor, Josh Litvack, Mark Hoffman, Charles Follette and Lucille La Salandra.  Most could be members of the club eventually.  We hope so.

FUTURE FRIDAY MEETINGS

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