Today’s program

Sarah Prosser, director or marketing for Wesley Highland Terrace.

 

New Paul Harris Fellow

Our newest Paul Harris Fellow is Bill Eddings, who has been active in our club from the moment he joined. President Dave Luiken inducted him at our last meeting. Bill is handling the club’s finances this year as our treasurer.

Our club is one of the few in the world to be 100% Paul Harris. We were among the first to achieve this goal.

Fireside Chats on Oct. 8

            Our annual Fireside Chats will be held at noontime on Oct. 8 at several locations. Rick James, Andy Peters, Pedro Fernandez and Jim Crone already have volunteered to be hosts.

Fireside Chats give members a chance to offer ideas and suggestions to improve our club, to increase our charitable activities, and to come up with plans that will bring good new members into our club.

           

Sheffield to walk for Haiti

            Once again Sheffield High students, and maybe some teachers, will walk to benefit the hospital in Haiti that our club supports. The 24-hour Haiti Tour d’Esprit walk will start on the afternoon of Oct. 1 and finish sometime in the early hours of Oct. 2. The students will get pledges that will be based on the number of hours they walk.

            This will be the third straight year that Sheffield, our adopted school, has participated in this activity. Linda Williams, a student counselor, is making the school arrangements. She walked last year and intends to do it again this year.

            Marty Petrusek, who was the architect in charge of building the4 Haiti hospital, is going all out this year. He’s going to try to walk 25 miles, a feat almost as difficult as running a marathon. Marty will call on each member to donate $25 if he walks the 25 miles. Seems fair – Marty has to do the hard work.

Hopefully most of our members also will take part in the walk for as many hours as possible. The idea is to have people walking all through the afternoon, night and morning – 24 hours of walking. Walkers can get sponsors who will contribute so much per mile covered by their walker.

 

Upcoming programs

Sept. 17 -- Alan Parker - Memphis Sand and Gravel

Sept. 24 -- Ken Edmondson of Edmondson Northstar is the scheduled speaker, but this is not yet confirmed

Oct. 1 -- Alan Babain - AARP Driver Ed 101

Oct. 8 -- Fireside Chats

Oct. 15 -- House of Mews- Elain Harvey, Founder

Oct. 22 -- Gay Johnson, Memphis Literacy Council

 

 

LeBonheur’s work outstanding

“The essence of LeBonheur is the staff -- they go above and beyond in their love, passion and caring for their patients” That was the word from Kavanaugh Casey, director of development for LeBonheur Children's Medical Center and the LeBonheur Foundation.

LeBonheur is recognized nationally for its outstanding medical work. Its neuro-science program is well known throughout the nation, and its pediatric trauma center is the only one of its kind in the Mid-South.

LeBonheur treats 40,000 patients a year. Two or three heart surgeries are performed every day. The facility has 225 beds and 558 medical doctors (50 are specialists). LeBonheur is caring for children from 44 states, and about half the patients are under the age of 4,

            LeBonheur was started in the 1940s when local pediatricians approached the LeBonheur Club to organize a clinic to help treat critically ill children. Backers raised $2 million and LeBonheur opened in 1952. Now LeBonheur is operating with a $45 million shortfall in receipts, so they rely on generous donors from around the country to help support their mission.

 

Special notices

            Jeff Jones has been in the hospital (Baptist Collierville with pneumonia).

President Dave read a note sent by Jack Robinson in Iraq. Jack thanked us for the two Care packages we sent.

Carlton Smith is making good progress on our web site "www.memphiscentralrotaryclub.org". He is adding material from our club, our district and Rotary International.

We are updating our Club Directory. If you wish a new photo, Harvey Marcom’s camera is ready. Bio sheets are available to update your personal data.

At our last meeting

Doc Harris introduced our guests. Laura House, Chickasaw activity director, was the guest of Lee Whipple. With Harvey Marcom was his son Greg Marcom, who is running for alderman in Germantown. Nathan Lubin of the Germantown club also visited with us.

All the money collected by Doyle Lemons for the weekly drawing went into our scholarship fund because winner Chris McDermott contributed his winnings to the club.

Carlton Smith put several members on The Wheel and spun a $4 fine for those assessed.

Tom Michael led us in the invocation and the Pledge to the Flag. Andy Peters introduced our guest speaker Kavanaugh Casey. Dave Luiken presided.

 

News from Sheffield

            “We are off The List!” That’s the big news at Sheffield High. Most Memphis city schools have not met the state requirements. Sheffield was on that last two years ago, but there has been so much improvement that they are among the small number of schools now meeting state requirements.

            Woodale High and Hillcrest High, two schools in our scholarship program, are the only other schools that have done well enough to get off The List.

            School authorities have asked for one of our banners so that they can display it in the school office. They want their students to know who their adopters are. Our club also is featured on Sheffield’s web site.

            Last year, five of our members went to Sheffield to deliver vocational talks to groups of students. This was a most popular program. President Dave intends to set up a similar program again this year.

 

Club roster