Daryl Cruser led us in the Flag Salute.

 

PP Joe thanked Bill Spellman for greeting and Vance Thompson for taking attendance.

 

Harriet Clune donated our raffle prize today which was a Visa gift card! Daryl Cruser sold our raffle tickets for Midge Stork today.

 

Guest of Bill Gray was his wife Kim Gray and guest of Husam Hishmeh was his nephew Shaker.

Juan Mendoza gave our Inspirational Message in a rather unique way!

 

John Borneman gave our joke of the week followed by our song of the week.

 

Greg Frye gave a vocational moment. Greg is a Corporate Benefits Specialist. He sells insurance, annuities, etc and works closely with his clients to insure they remain compliant.

 

PP Joe reminded the Board that the next Board Meeting would be on Tuesday March 1st, not Wednesday March 2nd.

 

Husam Hishmeh told us about his PETS experience. It was very interesting and Husam came back with a lot of ideas for the club.

 

Rich Stewart talked about the Atlas School homework club. Rich also told us that the City of Ventura is looking for 150th Anniversary Ambassador's. If you are interested in serving as an ambassador let Rich know.

 

Tom Swan reminded us about the City Center project on March 19th. We will be doing painting and gardening from 8:00 - 3:00.

 

Joe Strohman asked Harriet Clune, Tom Hashbarger and Tim Hughes to stand. Joe then handed them binders with essays from the 4 Way Test essays to evaluate. Carolyn Hertel will be donating prize money.

 

Jeff Hata spoke about the YMCA Victory dinner on March 4th at 6:00 - 8:00 at the Masonic Lodge.

 

PP Joe Strohman reminded us about our joint meeting with the South club on February 29th.

 

PP Joe Strohman asked how many people had their dominos with them today. Most of us did have our dominos with them!

 

Daryl Cruser conducted the raffle and our lucky winner was Rafael Canton. Rafa donated the gift card back to the club to use at another time.

 

Saturday is a Membership Seminar in Santa Barbara.

 

February 19th will be Tom Hashbarger's birthday. We all sang happy birthday to Mr. Hasbarger!!!

I remember a period -in the late seventies- when the membership of our Club was growing. I believe we were up to 80 members. During our meetings, the sliding wall that separates the Ventura Room from the Santa Paula Room was kept open in the middle. The buffet was served in the Ventura Room, so that we could meet in the Santa Paula Room. That worked out very well.

 

However, our members knew additional persons in the community who had expressed an interest in joining our Club. Several of us weighed the advantages and disadvantages of becoming larger. We agreed that if we became too large, the closeness of our inter-personal relations would suffer. We felt it would be better to create an additional Rotary Club. That would provide opportunity for more persons to enjoy the intimacy that we enjoyed, and to participate in the "Rotary Club Leadership" experience. However, at that time, we would not be allowed, by Rotary International, to create another club without the authorization of our "mother club" - The Ventura Rotary Club. Also, the new club would have to limit its membership to the east of the line of demarcation between the Ventura Club and the Rotary Club of Ventura-East.

 

Therefore, in 1978-79, when I was president of our Club, I and several other members of our Club's Board met with the Board of the Ventura Club. During our meeting, I said that it's harder to remember the names of members, the larger the club is. A member of the Ventura Club Board said: "I used to be a member of a Rotary Club, in Los Angeles, that had over 400 members. I remembered the name of every one of them." They denied our request. They told us we should grow bigger.

 

Subsequently, Rotary International changed the rules. After that, we created the Rotary Club of Ventura-South (4/29/83) and the Rotary Club of Ventura-Marina (3/29/85). For many years, our Club continued to have 75 - 80 members.