Thank you Chief for all your hard work and dedication to our city. Your update on the community and the Police department was informative and inspirational. We appreciate your creativity and kindness as a driver for your leadership. You are a Rotarian through and through: "Service before Self"
It was an honor to be at Danversport on November 14, 2024 honor Ray Bastarache as a
“Robert C. Wood Hero”
Ray is a genuine inspiration within the Rotary Club of Lynn, MA, and across Rotary as a whole. His passion and relentless "get it done" attitude have made him a cornerstone of the club and a respected figure in the city.
Reverend Bill Simpson, will soon be 100 years old. He was a Pastor of Bethany United Church of Christ of Lynn for 40 years. After officially retiring from active ministering, he was a volunteer pastor at the First Church Congregational in Swampscott. He was an ordained minister for over 60 years. He has been married for 41years to Margaret, better known as Peg. He was born in Maryland in the mid 1920’s and raised on a farm. He has a son Timothy as well as three grandchildren. In 1995, the Rotary Club of Lynn honored one of their own members, the Reverend William Simpson, for his contributions to the community and for his support for Rotary causes over many years.
Reverend Simpson was also an honorary member of the Rotary Club of Edinburgh, Scotland in 1952-53, and joined the Lynn Rotary Club in 1983. In his nearly 40 years of membership, Reverend Simpson was known as a true Rotarian who lived the principal of “Service Above Self”. He was the Program Committee Chairman, and participated in many Rotary activities over the years. He has been a strong supporter of Camp Rotary, a member of its Board, and helped each year in helping to identify local youths as camp participants in need of scholarship help. He was a youth counsellor in public schools in Lynn and Lynnfield for several years.
Reverend Bill consistently volunteered to serve at My Brother’s Table well into his 90’s. He worked shoulder to shoulder with members 30 and 40 years younger than him. Bill was a regular volunteer at the monthly Catholic Charities food distribution. Unfortunately, Covid put a temporary stop to both of those activities. During the period when My Brother’s Table could not have volunteers inside, Bill and Peg made hundreds of PB&J’s at home for delivery to the “Table” numerous times.
In the summer of 2021 he provided personal funds to a woman so she could have an old RV towed from NH to Lynn for a place to call home for several months.
In September 2022, he reached out to a member of the St. Vincent de Paul Society to assist a woman with an urgent food need and in need of emergency funds for a dental procedure.
Those are only a couple examples of people reaching out to the “Reverend” for assistance. They knew that he was a person one could reach out to for help.
Members of Rotary Club of Lynn toured the Lynn Branch of Girl's Inc. The members gained a better understanding of the mission of Girl's Inc.
The members were able to visit classrooms where the girls were either learning or conducting a session. In some of the classes the girls rotate the leader of the class to give them experience in leadership.
Thank you to our Rotarians that were able to meet at Girls, Inc.
Getting to know the facility and meet the students is inspirational to our service mission. Thank you for your support.
Ted Dillard has a reputation for getting a whole lot of people together in a very small room, supplying them with all manner of interesting devices, and watching what happens. He can most generously be called an “enabler”.
The Founder and now Co-Director of The Brickyard Collaborative, he credits The Brickyard Collaborative as an idea that was perfect for a city that was ripe for opportunity a makerspace could afford, and didn’t know enough about him to run him out of town at the outset.
Maker Nick use the tools at the Brick Yard to make his own Guitars.
October is National Domestic Violence Awareness Month, and the speaker for our in-person Rotary Club meeting on October 17 was Julie Gerraughty from HAWC (Healing Abuse, Working for Change), a nonprofit organization providing services to survivors of domestic abuse throughout the North Shore. During our meeting, we collected new sheets (twin and queen sizes) and towels for donation to those survivors living in HAWC's shelter. HAWC lets clients take their sheets and towels with them when they move out of the shelter, so they are always in need of replacements.
Thank you for your generosity, it was greatly appreciated!
I am honored to begin my second year as the President of the Rotary Club of Lynn, MA. I have been a Rotarian for 3 years now and the opportunity to give back to my community through service has been so rewarding. I am constantly asked what is the Rotary Club and my quick answer to that is we are an international organization who’s main focus is service through volunteer work and participation in local and international efforts. On a more specific note we volunteer in local organizations such as My Brothers Table, the Mobile Food Bank, Catholic Charities, Lynn Shelter Association, etc. We give out annual scholarships to high school seniors and recognize 8th grade students who have overcome obstacles in life and so much more. I have many ideas for what we will accomplish this year and I am looking forward to a fun Rotary year. If you would like to become more involved in the city of Lynn you might want to consider joining us.
Note: For the meeting schedule, please look at the upcoming events listing/calendar on this site. Satellite meetings are at Land of a Thousand Hills Coffee, 61 Munroe St. Lynn
For Club information, or for Zoom links, email: lynn.rotary@gmail.com
The Rotary Club of Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, a multiethnic club founded in 2002, rebuilt a bridge that collapsed during the war in the former Yugoslav republic
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