Mike Flemming is the very passionate talk show host at WREC 600 AM -- Monday to Friday in the afternoon. He has always wanted to cover politics, so living in Memphis must be a perfect place for a journalist to cover politics with all the exciting political happenings here. He is first and foremost a journalist ande in particular an investigative reporter. He has been fortunate enough to have covered all the major sports events, and he even negotiated a jail riot in Memphis. Today Mike will share some thoughts on on "King" Willie Herenton and Sen. John Ford.

March 25 -- No meeting -- Good Friday

April 1 – Heather Baugos of AIA Memphis, a chapter of the American Institute of Architecture

April 8 – Kevin Kane, CEO of the Memphis Convention and Visitors Bureau

April 15 – Character Achievement Awards

You have only four days left to register for the District Conference at the $25 rate. After March 15 the charge will go up to $35. Our club will reimburse you for $25. The conference will take place at the Hilton Inn here in Memphis on April 22 and 23. Our club is the host for the conference because Dick Wieland is our District Governor.

Chickasaw Country Club will not be available for our usual club meeting on April 22. However, making up will be easy since attendance at the conference counts for attending a meeting. President Dave Luiken urges all members to attend the District luncheon scheduled on Saturday, April 23, which costs $20.00 per person.
 

Jerry Daws has accepted District Governor Dick Wieland’s invitation to serve as chairman for the annual District Conference. This is a big job, so Jerry is going to need a lot of help, especially since he will be heading up the scholarship committee activity at the same time. When Jerry asks for your help, make sure your answer is YES.

All club members should make an effort to attend as many conference sessions as possible. It’s a great way to learn more about Rotary and to get to know Rotarians from other clubs.

We welcomed two guests at our meeting last week. Bev Bomarito of NAPA was the guest of Lee Whipple. Rosemarie Ardire, who moved to Memphis recently from Fresno CA, visited us for the second time. She was a Rotarian with the Woodward Park club in Fresno, where her classification was Staffing Services. By the way, Rosemarie is a marathoner. She has competed and finished in two marathons and two half-marathons.

April 22-23: The annual District 6800 Conference will take place at the Hilton Hotel, Memphis. Our own Dick Wieland is District Governor, so our club will serve as the host. Jerry Daws is chairman.

May 5-7: GSE Team from Nottingham, England, will visit the Memphis area. Rotarian families are needed to handle local hosting duties. Please consider volunteering to serve as a host during the team’s stay.
 

May 13: Annual Scholarship Program at which six high school seniors will be awarded $1500 scholarships. The committee, headed once again by Jerry Daws, selects the winners on criteria based on grade scores, SAT results, activities and an essay. The top dozen candidates are then interviewed individually by the committee before the final selections are made.

June 2 has been set as the date for annual golf tournament, one of our two major fund-raising activities of the year. The event will take place at the Fox Meadows Golf Course. The original suggested dates were unfavorable for many of our members.

Major efforts to upgrade student accomplishments are working at Sheffield High. The graduation rate was only 37% in 2003, but it rose to 53% in 2004 and seems to be headed even higher this year. After an uphill struggle, the school won state certification last year.

The state accreditation team checked out the school last week and was quite impressed with the progress that has been made and the programs that have been inaugurated. First there is the Teacher Walk. Teachers visit other classrooms to observe and get ideas. There is an after-school recovery program for seniors who have fallen behind and are in danger of not graduating. A mentor program has been put into place. Math teachers have taken two courses in thinking math so that they can make math more readily understood.

Centennial Convention

Rotary’s Centennial will be celebrated from June 18-22 in Chicago, where Rotary got its start. This is an excellent opportunity for our members to get involved on the international level.

Our club needs new blood, and these statistics show why. More than half our members have been in the club at least 15 years. The Old Guard is still doing a great job, but they won’t be with us forever.

Does it surprise you that 11 of our present members have been with us almost since the day the club was formed? That’s slightly more than 25%, quite a high percentage. Four are charter members, two more joined the club in the first year and five became members the second year.

The charter members are Chester Perry, John Shepherd, Jim Vanderburg and Tidwell Semmes. In the same year – 1975 – Leroy Dahler and Bob Neal became members. Al Hollingsworth, Lee Whipple, L.D. Beard, Jeff Jones and Bill Matthews joined in 1976.

Three more members have 25 years of Rotary service under their belts – John Bennett, Henry Francis and R.E. Linkous became members in 1980

Another 10 became members later in the Eighties: Tom Michael (1982), Jerry Daws and Marty Petrusek (1983), Rod Ashley (1984), Gordon Wilson (1985), Floyd McDaniel and Don Palmer (1986), Bert Canfield, Henry Springer and Randolph Reeves (1988).