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| Volume 65, Issue 28 | Rota-Scribe: Jay Kremer | |||||||||||
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President Joyce Capelle opened the meeting at the Hope International meeting hall. Dan Fisk led the flag salute and Howard Wood and Randy McFarland led the singing of an old favorite,”I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles,” as well as the Rotary welcoming song. Jim Lapak welcomed guests. Ray Hansen’s guest was Allen Gugan, a retired Methodist Minister and prior Rotarian. Bill Schenk’s guest was his wife, Cathy Schenk. Two guests from District administration were Greg Owen and Tom Scott, both from Long Beach. Gregg Hickman was the guest of J Richey. Art Levine who is studying to become a Hebrew Rabbi gave a different and quite interesting invocation. Art gave as the invocation a traditional Jewish prayer said after the meal as proscribed in the Bible at Deuteronomy 8:10. The prayer was given in Hebrew with an English translation available at the tables. President Joyce Capelle announced a Joker’s Challenge pitting Mike Oates against Pat McKinley. The jokes made all Rotarians laugh. The applause evaluator, Joyce Capelle, declared the contest close but the winner was Pat McKinley. Pat was declared available for joke challenges from Rotarians for next week’s meeting. In announcements, Rick Crane reminded Rotarians about the February 2, 2006 women’s basketball game at Cal-State Fullerton. Also, Community Investment requests need to be into Buck Catlin quickly to be considered for this year’s Rotary awards. Cameron McCune gave a short summary of why technology in Fullerton schools is important and referred Rotarians to a short printed summary on each table. Minard Duncan thanked Rotarians for coming to the recent dental clinic at Richman School where 102 students were treated. Dick Daybell reminded all that they need to schedule their fellowship lunches as soon as feasible. J Richey announced a meeting of the program committee and Walt Barnes gave the Paul Harris award to Julianne Haynes. |
Jim Williams, the Recognition Chairman, turned over the meeting to Art Levine as Fine Master. Art fined Tom Meyer as being quoted in a local newspaper as retiring from work to devote his time to worthy projects but forgetting to mention that being president-elect of this Rotary chapter is one of these projects. Dick Daybell was recognized and fined for his January birthday. Dan Kincaid was recognized for his wife’s birthday. All recognized Rotarians were asked to answer a question using Talmudic reasoning. All except Dan Kincaid failed the test and were fined. The main speaker today was Gordon Dillow, a long-time columnist for the Orange Co. Register Newspaper. Gordon Dillow was an embedded journalist with Alpha Company, First Battalion, Fifth Marine Regiment in the Iraq war. Dillow gave an eloquent talk describing the valor and abilities of the Marine fighting men in this war. Dillow’s Alpha Company was the first Marine company into Iraq at the start of the war. Dillow noted that of the 185,000 Marines about 85% were 25 years old or younger but were given great responsibility in the war. In the initial passage through a bad area of Baghdad, now known as Sadr City, the Iraq people were cheering and very friendly to the advancing Americans. This changed in time to their using deceptive practices to kill or harm American service personnel. Dillow dwelled on how fortunate we are to have such brave and disciplined men defending our country. At the end of the talk, Dillow was given a standing ovation by all Rotarians for his talk and his efforts in Iraq.
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