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HAPPY 250 ISSUE JULY 4, 2026
VOL. 7 NO. 1
FROM MARK TO PATTI, WELCOME TO OUR 2026-27 ROTARY YEAR
NEWS-NOTES-NONSENSE
On Thursday Jess Levan joined us to talk about a typical day in the life of wildlife biologist, in other words, her life. She serves as the wildlife biologist for the Missouri Department of Conservation in St. Louis. She suggested that each of us create wildlife habitat, the size of the space does not matter. Jess told us to not plant Bush Honeysuckle, they are very invasive. She did not have a simple solution for RobinK's skunk family issue.
Opening duties were covered by KarenJ, MarkSp and DianeS.
Birthday wishes go out to AllenH -today!
Prez Patti and Prez-elect Glenn were out of town so MarkSm stepped up to the podium to ring the bell.
Early arrivals included-DianeS, KarenJ and MarkSm.
Our ClubRunner website and associated services are running on their new Nova platform. If you are having any issues with the ClubRunner system, please feel free to reach out to BradP for assistance.
Our golf tournament is on Saturday July 18th @ Belk (2 weeks from today!) It's time to finalize your teams and submit your sponsorship form. JoeS will soon send out a request for play day volunteers. Please encourage all your golf buddies/work associates/family members to consider joining us for this fun event. See the flyer below for the details.
MarkSm announced that our August Pints For Polio event will be held from 5:30-9:30. Registration will be live soon.
Slide-right-inners-CoryG, TomS, ScottL and GeorgeM.
Our visitors included Mark Vaughn (always nice to have him on board) and AllenH's Daughter Amy, along with her two sons.
Last to arrive included GeorgeM, ChrisH, ScottL and CoryG.
There were 20 members dining on chicken fried chicken, mashed taters, gravy, rolls, creamy cole slaw and cake.
SAA RickH recruited our Tennessee Volunteer MarkSp to serve as the Finemaster. RobinK and MarkSm paid Happy Fines. We sang the birthday song to AllenH. All the trivia Q's were related to our flag and 250th anniversary. Happy Birthday America! Tired of the heat? Pay a $.
The $127 jackpot went unclaimed by RobinK and BradP. TomS won the scratch-off.
PRESENTING SHERRY, OUR NEWEST PAUL HARRIS FELLOW
BUSINESS OF THE YEAR
HELMKAMP CONSTRUCTION
OUR PAUL HARRIS CLAN
INSTALLATION GATHERING
LOOKING FOR TEAMS AND SPONSORS
HELP LILLY PREPARE FOR HER ITALIAN ADVENTURE
DINNER RECAP
After a great dinner, prepared by the folks at Food A Fare, we got down to the business at hand-
PaulH recognized members celebrating five year service milestones.
LillyB brought us up to speed on how her long- term exchange to Italy is progressing. She does not have a firm departure date yet, but anticipates her flight will be the first week of September.(Don't forget about her July 19 going away party. See above)
GlennB presented our Business of the Year award to two representatives from Helmkamp Construction Company
Prez Mark made three Paul Harris Fellowship presentations. AllenH received two of them, one in honor of his late wife Pam and one for his PHF plus 3. SherryT was recognized as our member PHF selectee.
Prez Mark recognized the members who served as club officers and event chairpersons this past year.
MarkSm the passed the gavel to new Prez Patti. She then recognized Mark for his outstanding year as our president.
Prez Patti introduced her officers and diectors for the 2026-27 Rotary year. She then spent a few minutes reviewing her goals for the year. She want's us to have an impact this year. And we are off!
Which country became the latest to limit teen access to social media (banning those under 16 starting next year)?
A. Australia
B. New Zealand
C. Ireland
D. United Kingdom
(Find the answer near the end of the newsletter)
Today is National Eat Your Beans Day
What is the largest Canadian province by area?
Ontario
British Columbia
Prince Edward Island
Quebec
Occupying more than 15% of Canada's total area, Quebec is the largest of the country’s 10 provinces. The French-Canadian region covers more than 500,000 square miles of land and an additional 70,000 square miles of water.
FROM OUR ARCHIVES
Sourced from the Eastender News, Make-Up and Banner newsletters
July 2021
We tranisitioned from Prez Lindsey to Prez Robin. Robin opened her first meeting with an emphatic bell clang.
We heard about the East Alton Farmer's Market.
Happy Fines were collected from BillP, DaveA and LoriP.
We were still looking for a Soap Box Race driver.
We donated $500 to the Back to School
Giveaway program.
LoriP was looking for any Baseball Mania late returns.
GeorgeM and JoeS went looking for the joker.
PHOTOS OF THE WEEK
DATELINE:ROTARY
RI TAIPEI CONVENTION WRAPS
The Rotary International Convention in Taipei, Taiwan, ended on a high note as singer Leona Lewis brought thousands of attendees to their feet with a stirring performance that included the resilience anthem “Fire Under My Feet” during the closing ceremony on 17 June.
Taipei’s warm hospitality was on full display as hundreds of Rotary volunteers formed a human corridor outside the venue, greeting departing attendees with cheers and celebratory gestures. Many people stopped to take selfies and exchange farewells before heading home.
The four-day event attracted more than 38,000 people from 140 countries and regions, making it one of Rotary’s largest conventions in recent years.
“This year, I spoke often about uniting for good,” said Rotary International President Francesco Arezzo, a member of the Rotary Club of Ragusa, Italy. “These past days, we have seen what that means. Rotary is a meeting place — where strangers become friends, friendship becomes trust, where trust becomes action.”
Inspirational speakers
The convention featured impressive speakers, led by Malala Yousafzai, the youngest-ever Nobel Peace Prize laureate and a leading advocate for girls’ education.
Yousafzai, whose father was a Rotary member, began advocating for education in Pakistan before she was a teenager. At age 15, she survived a Taliban attack aimed at silencing her activism. Following months of surgery and rehabilitation in the United Kingdom, she co-founded the Malala Fund to continue her campaign for girls’ education worldwide. In 2014, at age 17, she received the Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of her efforts to advance education and equality. She graduated from Oxford University in 2020 with a degree in philosophy, politics, and economics.
“I started my campaign for education at 11 years old,” Yousafzai said during the second general session on 16 June. “At first, it was just me and my father speaking out for girls’ right to go to school. But it is the people who have come alongside us, our collective work, that gives me hope.”
While acknowledging progress, she noted that about 120 million girls worldwide remain out of school, and she urged attendees to support girls as leaders. “Girls understand the problems best, and they understand the solutions best,” Yousafzai said.
She also encouraged Rotary members to help ensure that every girl has access to quality education.
“Over the years, I’ve learned that one person cannot change the world alone, that every movement in history was built by many hands,” Yousafzai said. “When you go home, look for girls in your community who are at risk of dropping out. Ask teachers what you can do to support their work. We need your bold and ambitious vision to build a better future for girls.”
Yousafzai also received a warm response when discussing mental health and her recovery from the attack.
“I initially focused only on physical recovery, but later I realized the importance of mental health,” she said. “Therapy helped me recognize that asking for help is strength, not weakness. I chose to be open about my struggles because young people around the world need to know they are not alone.”
Another challenge for the future came in the closing session from Salome Agbaroji, the 2023-24 National Youth Poet Laureate of the United States, who performed her poem “HOPE.”
“When you change hope from an attitude into an action, we get much closer to building the world we aspire to,” she said after performing the poem. “You, Rotary members, are the scientists and engineers of the small social revolutions that achieve great and measurable good.”
Expanding Rotary’s global impact
Rotary Foundation Trustee Chair Holger Knaack highlighted the global reach of Rotary’s humanitarian work and introduced the newest Programs of Scale grant recipient: Collaboration for Sustainable Water and Sanitation Systems in Haiti. To continue reading, link here
The initiative, led by Haitian Rotarians, builds on work with Haitian organizations and the national water agency. It aims to reduce waterborne disease by strengthening local capacity and by training community leaders, water operators, and municipal officials. To continue reading, link herehttps://shorturl.at/D8mDP
AND I QUOTE
Quotes from Abraham Lincoln-
"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
"I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence."
"Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others."
“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.”
SMILE
Knock, knock. / Who’s there? / Midas. / Midas who? / Midas well admit it, you don’t even know who I am!
Knock, knock. / Who’s there? / Lettuce. / Lettuce who? / Lettuce in — it’s cold out here.
Knock, knock. / Who’s there? / Ben and Don. / Ben and Don who? / Ben there, Don that.
Knock, knock. / Who’s there? / Lucas. / Lucas who? / Lucas in the eye and tell us you don’t want to hear another knock-knock joke!
THE NUMBERS
Since 2020, more than 90 recalls have been issued by automakers for more than 11 million vehicles-National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
The average American household holds about $11,500 in card debt, according to calculations by WalletHub. The figure is almost $1,600 less per household than in inflation-adjusted dollars at the 2007 peak.
About a quarter of all U.S. work days are now worked from home, about three times pre-Covid levels of remote work-Survey of Working Arrangements and Attitudes
A home buyer in 2019 could expect to spend about $20,000 a year on basic homeownership expenses: mortgage payments, property taxes, insurance, maintenance and repairs. By 2025, that annual bill had increased to $28,500-Intercontinental Exchange and Angi
A 2025 national poll by the chain operations platform InTouch Insight found that 72% of respondents viewed convenience stores as a desirable alternative to fast-food and fast-casual chains, a double-digit jump from similar polls published in preceding years
The FBI received more than 31,000 complaints of internet crimes against people under age 20 last year, up 74% from 2024 and about three times the number in 2015
(Trivia answer-D)
ROTARY'S AREAS OF FOCUS
These have been identified to help build international relationships, improve lives and create a better world to support our peace efforts and end polio forever
