test (Jan. 09, 2026)

January 19, 2026

Please join Rotarian Devin Kyle in welcoming Freddy Williams with The Boys and Girls Club of Greater Tampa Bay

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Thanks William Thomas for your update on the Bing House...

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For more information about The Boys & Girls Club...

🎉 We are... - Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Tampa Bay | Facebook

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next week's program is to be determined

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Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American civil rights activist and Baptist minister who was a leader of the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968. He advanced civil rights for people of color in the United States through the use of nonviolent resistance and civil disobedience against Jim Crow laws and other forms of legalized discrimination, which most commonly affected African Americans.

A Black church leader, King participated in and led marches for the right to vote, desegregation, labor rights, and other civil rights.^[1] He oversaw the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott and was the first president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), leading the unsuccessful Albany Movement in Albany, Georgia, and helping organize nonviolent 1963 protests in Birmingham, Alabama. King was one of the leaders of the 1963 March on Washington, where he delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech, and helped organize two of the three Selma to Montgomery marches during the 1965 Selma voting rights movement. There were dramatic standoffs with segregationist authorities, who often responded violently.^[2] The civil rights movement achieved pivotal legislative gains in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968.

King was jailed several times. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director J. Edgar Hoover considered King a radical and made him an object of COINTELPRO from 1963. FBI agents investigated him for possible communist ties, spied on his personal life, and secretly recorded him. In 1964, the FBI mailed King a threatening anonymous letter, which he interpreted as an attempt to make him commit suicide.^[3] King won the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize for combating racial inequality through nonviolent resistance. In his final years, he expanded his focus to include opposition towards poverty and the Vietnam War.

In 1968, King was planning a national occupation of Washington, D.C., to be called the Poor People's Campaign, when he was assassinated on April 4 in Memphis, Tennessee. James Earl Ray was convicted of the assassination, though it remains the subject of conspiracy theories. King's death led to riots in US cities. King was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1977 and Congressional Gold Medal in 2003. Martin Luther King Jr. Day was established as a holiday in cities and states throughout the United States beginning in 1971; the federal holiday was first observed in 1986. The Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., was dedicated in 2011.

Member Birthdays

Randy Larson

January 2

Louis Alvarez

January 7

Justin Simonds

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January 10

Jeremy Burris

January 16

Reggie Holt

January 17

Lisa Rhodes

January 22

James Moody

January 25

Frederick Lawrence

February 2

Curtis Devane

February 3

Randy Bailey

February 3

Christine Miller

February 7

Charles Harris

February 13

Mike Stone

February 13

Phillip Glidewell

February 22

Jeff Lucas

February 23

Billy Keel

February 25

Join Date

Jim Scott

January 1, 2002

24 years

Bill Wicker

January 2, 1989

37 years

Keith Smith

January 5, 2004

22 years

Ron Gainey

January 5, 1987

39 years

Tim Kip

January 6, 1997

29 years

Chuck Gore

January 7, 2019

7 years

Jeff Lucas

January 8, 2018

8 years

Rick Lott

January 9, 2023

3 years

Josh Darland

January 12, 2024

2 years

Jodi Stevens

January 14, 2013

13 years

Randy Bailey

January 24, 2011

15 years

Marty Clay

January 28, 2013

13 years

Jeremy Burris

January 30, 2003

23 years

Tom Sparkman

January 30, 2006

20 years

Ed Bozeman

January 31, 1994

32 years

Michael Cameron

February 3, 2025

1 year

Dennis Digamon

February 14, 1994

32 years

Charles Bates

February 27, 2023

3 years

Wesley Joyner

February 27, 2023

3 years

The game changer
Meet your 2026-27 Rotary president, Olayinka Hakeem Babalola

Indian developer donates US$50 million to The Rotary Foundation
Ravishankar Dakoju pledged that he and his wife and fellow club member, Paola Dakoju, would donate approximately US$50 million (4.5 billion Indian rupees) to The Rotary Foundation.

Olayinka H. Babalola urges members of Rotary to Create Lasting Impact
Rotary International president-elect emphasizes effective action and ‘embracing the world with open arms’

Nanotechnology brings safer water to the Ganges Delta
Nanotechnology brings safer water to the Ganges Delta

Care for the emotional wounds
A husband-and-wife team came up with first aid for mental health on a dog walk. They want you — yes, you — to join this global movement