10/10/15 BITS & PIECES

Posted by John Marr 
 
Fortunately, our club is masterfully lead by President Bowen Depke, who is able to tuck the multitude of meeting events into a neat package, week after week. He had to get things going early since we had much to get done in order to get out by 1:30. Of course he was able to do it! He welcomed 53 members, 2 visiting Rotarians and 3 guests.
 
George Crockett was presented with a special Rotary pin backer for sponsoring a new member this year. 
 
Every year the club is intent on increasing our membership in order to have the strength to do the many magnificent Rotary deeds. This year we are in competition with our southern neighbor Portsmouth, NH Rotary and we seem to be doing well. Kathy Grammer introduced Jean Murachanian to the club. Jean is with the Conservatory of Music and will be a welcome addition to “the club that loves to sing.” 
 
 
The second new member was sponsored by Paul T. Gore (PTG), who introduced Travis Parker. Travis comes to us by way of West Hampton, New Hampshire. He is the father of four boys and has to be a natural for an association with our youth services effort.
 
 
The weekly raffle was aptly run by Megan Devlin and when the ticket pulled could not be clearly deciphered, a second ticket was pulled, giving John Marr the opportunity to try and pull the Queen of Hearts, but he couldn't find it.
 
Then it was discovered the original ticket drawn was not held at the correct angle to read that it belonged to P.T.G. To abide by the 4-Way Test, Paul Gore was given a chance to also try and find the Queen of Hearts, but he, too, couldn't locate the elusive queen....so the pot continues to grow. 
 
When Maestro Russ Burleigh and Mizzo Soprano Kathy Grammer collaborate, you can be sure that it's going to be special and challenging. Russ, Meredith Small and Amy Chipman led us in a decent singing of “Take Me Home, Country Roads.” We are sure that our new members were amused and enthused to become part of our merry band.
 
As our club celebrates 100 years, we look back over time, recall and reflect on what was going on during those formative years. This week's history teacher was Don Lowry, who told us what was going on during Rotary year 1934-5. Since all notes had to be recorded using that ancient technical instrument called a typewriter, details of presentations and discussions are somewhat limited, so a review of the contemporary events were included. Don did a little research and told us that during that Rotary year the nefarious Dillinger met his maker. On a much better note, aeronautic heroin Amelia Earhart took to the skies to circumnavigate the globe. Closer to home, the Club President was Neal Allen and it was mentioned that the club was quite proud to have raised a little more that $1200 in fund raising during the year....clearly a buck went a lot further during the desperate days of the Great Depression. Coming by funding was difficult at best, but the club endured. One of the guest speakers addressed, if you can believe it, the “problem of taxes in Maine.” I guess we can't blame Governor LePage for being the nay-sayer and it proves again that while the dates may change, there’s a consistency of problems and complaints.
 
President Bowen, explained to the Club the elements of our club budget. He explained the separation of the club and the Service and Memorial Fund (S&M), which has about $250K in the coffers to help with those special needs that fit the strictures that have been set on the fund. In addition to the S & M, we have the charitable budget and the budget that deals with the administration of the day-to-day activities of the club. As we are all from a business background we seem to be doing a fine job of managing our money according to the report.