After reciting the Pledge of Allegiance and The Four-Way Test, Ryan Welle offered the invocation. Guy Olson from Sunrise Rotary was with us and Dean Monke introduced three Student Athletes from Hillcrest, Luke Bowman, Ruthanne Erickson and Nicole Dekok, all seniors. Luke hails from Jamestown, North Dakota and is involved in track and field, cross-country and is a member of Hillcrest's Knowledge Bowl team going to State; he will be going to the Naval Academy next year. Ruthanne is from Williston, North Dakota, and participates in softball and basketball and was the student manager of the volleyball team last fall. She plans to go to M State in Moorhead next year, pursuing a degree in radiology. Nicole was recognized for her involvement in softball; she also played volleyball last fall and is in the Hillcrest choir.
Laurie Larson introduced Morgan Lider who received the Wesleyu A. Waage Rotary Memorial Scholarship this year. She graduated from Rothsay in 2016, is a volleyball player, and hopes to become a veterinarian. She will be at M State next year and plans on pursuing her studies at NDSU and then the University of Minnesota.
President Katie reminded us of the Josh the Otter book distribution next week; books will be out before the meeting so those arriving a little early can attach stickers and then after the meeting members will be heading off to McKinley and OLV. Lori Larson announced a get together at Mabel Murphy's on May 1st from 4:30 to 6:00 p.m. to discuss how to make Rotary more important to our current membership. Buzz Lundeen promoted the upcoming MS Walk.
There was a Rotary Minute based upon the April, 2017 Rotarian, and although we started out slowly those assembled ended up answering three out of five questions correctly.
When we got into brags and fines Lori Larson talked about what has now occurred, the Bigwood Lecture at the College on Thursday the 6th. Keith Olson, after noting the ankle monitor being worn by this author, talked about floating down the Yellowstone River and catching 50 walleyes and saugers on his trip to Montana. Hal Leland was back from spending a sunny month in the south. Guy Olson talked about taking a trip with his wife to the southern U.S. and also memorialized Kitty Heyen, Rod Ebersviller's sister, who died March 31st at the age of 91. Katie Johnson bragged about having the best pizza she may have ever had at Johnny B's in Jamestown and making a college visit with her son when they were out in Montana to Montana State in Bozeman, his likely choice.
Buzz Lundeen introduced Paul Dubbles, a "conservationist in the farm business." Pat farms with his brother John and sells seed for the elevator in French; his wife works for the Minnesota Department of Education. Pat and his wife like to take long road trips all over the U.S. and Canada but today he was with us to talk about conservation farming, which he has been doing since the 1970's. He brought along a lot of pictures and statistics that supported his approach, using either strip tilling or no-tilling methods. He said that the adage "no till, no crop" is not correct, but acknowledged his methods are an "acquired taste." It gets you very close to zero erosion and, done properly, can be as productive in the short-term as a chisel-plowed field. He acknowledged there is a steep learning curve to do what he does but that now his neighbor, Charlie Piekarski, has been converted and they are using his field to conduct a five-year study of the process in cooperation with the University of Minnesota. This was a really interesting program and all because Buzz saw that Paul was into Lundeens to have an article on the Dubbles' farming methods that originally appeared in Progressive Farmer reprinted and Buzz saw it and arranged for the program. Thanks Buzz and Paul for a great program!
New Member Proposed: Katie Johnson has proposed Mitzi Moe with the classification of "Newspaper Publisher" as a member. If no objections are received by a Board member within seven days, she will be asked to become a member.
