Norwich Rotary Club
August 9th, 2023
Location-Bella Fiore
THE RONE
Presiding: Mary Richardson
Invocation: Rodney Green
Fellowship: Nancy Gentes
Nancy announced the following Rotarian Birthday’s! Tom Adams on 8/12 and Bonnie Johnson on 8/18. Alexis Kahn introduced her guest Stephanie Gelinas from Chelsea Groton Bank. Today is the anniversary of the 2nd atomic bomb that was dropped on the Japanese city of Nagasaki in 1945. Seeing as the movie Oppenheimer is the #1 movie in America at the moment Nancy gave a brief history of the man who developed the 1st atomic bomb. Oppenheimer was born into a non-observant Jewish family in New York City on April 22, 1904 to Ella, a painter, and Julius Seligmann Oppenheimer, a successful textile importer. At age 18, Oppenheimer entered Harvard College, where he majored in chemistry. The FBI under J. Edgar Hoover had been following Oppenheimer since before the war, when he showed Communist sympathies as a professor at Berkeley and had been close to members of the Communist Party. 18 of his colleagues who worked on the Manhattan Project received Nobel Prizes while Oppenheimer never was awarded one.
Announcements:
Golf Committee member Gary Young said golfers, volunteers, sponsors and auction items are still being accepted. If you want to volunteer contact Gary directly. Gary brought Auction items to today’s meeting for early bidding. There will be no regular meeting that day. If you have a speaker for a weekly meeting that you wish to schedule contact Alexis Kahn or Kevin Wickless and a meeting can be scheduled. There will be an Amber Alert sign-up at UCFS at the Edward & Mary Lord location on August 10th from 1 to 3pm. Also Amber Alert’s will be at The Healthy Living Expo on September 9th 10-2pm and the Celebrate Cultural Diversity Event. Need 2 volunteers to assist in signing up children. Nominees are being sought for a number of awards at the Celebrate Cultural Diversity Event on September 18th. Contact President Mary for applications.
Membership Minute: Stan Lucas
Stan said the Board approved holding a cocktail party at his house at 280 Broadway in Norwich on September 13th at 5pm. Invitations will be made and cocktails at 5pm and an informational meeting at 6 on the avenues of service in Rotary. Members are encouraged to bring a prospective member and invitations will also go out to current members who are dormant and disengaged with the club and remind them of our purpose. There will be no noontime meeting that day. Stay tuned for further details when the invitations will be ready.
Happy Dollars: Andy Grant
*Andy started things off saying he is happy to have his daughter and his 2 granddaughters visit last week and they made it safely back home.
*Andrew Nollman said he was happy to have attended another live concert this past Friday, spent time with friends Saturday and he lost power on Sunday for 8 hours. He was disappointed that his generator failed to operate but was happy that Jeff Bruning and the good folks at NPU fixed the power problem so fast.
*Rodney Green told a story in keeping with Nancy’s “Oppenheimer” theme about one of the items on the Olde Tymes menu called Phil’s Phyne Pheaud. Rodney’s brother, a retired rocket scientist, makes his living now with Raku ceramics. Phil likes to make fun of our Tennessee country heritage by using “Faux French” spelling, but he keeps it simple and hearty when eating. His brother Phil always said when testing nuclear devices in the Nevada desert he referred to everything as “The Site” and “The Event.”
*Stan Lucas bought 20 Sea Unicorn tickets at last week’s auction to take his grandson’s Little League team to the game. He sold 2 of the tickets to Susy Hurlbert and the other 18 went to the kids. He ended up misplacing the tickets and ended up having to buy new seats at $12.00 a pop. Of course the kids wanted Sea Unicorn hats so that added another $250.00. Stan then added that you got to feed them, another $200.00 and desert! However all was not lost, he met 2 people who needed Will’s drawn up for them, so he recouped what he laid out and then some!
*Jeff Bruning welcomed our guest Stephanie and thanked Andrew for the nice comments about NPU. Last week he finally got his sailboat in the water and took a nice sail out to Martha’s Vineyard and the other islands that covered 220 nautical miles. He was able to sail the entire time without using the engine as there was good and favorable breeze the entire trip!
*Susy Hurlbert told Stan that she never did make it to the Sea Unicorns game after all! She gave a $500.00 check to go toward the Rotary Clock Project. Also, Ernie’s son and daughter-in-law are now the proud parents of a baby boy!
*Alexis Kahn said thank you to her guest Stephanie for joining her at today’s meeting. She also told that she recently was boarding a horse at her farm for a friend that was sold. She had a feeling the buyer was not a good horse owner and bought the horse back! She said her husband said no more horses, but she’s confident that she can slide it through as her wedding anniversary is Sunday and that’s going to be her gift!
*Mary Richardson is happy that she is going on vacation and her sister is joining her for a trip to Boston and then on to Florida!
*Barry Shead had $20.00 on behalf of Kathleen Stauffer who wants to send her best wishes to the club. Barry also had a nice visit to the New England Air Museum with his daughter-in-law last week.
*Kevin Wickless welcomed Stephanie to the meeting and said he is a fellow native of Michigan also. Kevin also thanked Gary Young for all his hard work on the Golf Tournament.
Weekly Auction: No auction today.
Lottery: Barry Shead
Andrew Nollman, Rodney Green and Mary Richardson drew cards and the Ace of Spades was not found. Jim Daly came out a winner as he won Barry Shead’s ARC Cookies!
Program: There was no official program this week. However President Mary was happy to report the “Pop-Up” service project to donate school supplies to put into children’s back packs was successful with lots of crayons, pencils and other assorted school supplies donated.
President Mary lead the club with the 4-Way Test and the meeting was adjourned at 12:50pm See Below for important Golf Tournament Information!
THE ROTARY CLUBS OF NORWICH ANNUAL GOLF TOURNAMENT
WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 6, 2023 – NORWICH GOLF COURSE
VOLUNTEER NEWS!!
IF NOT FOR FRIENDLY AND WILLING VOLUNTEERS THIS ANNUAL GOLF TOURNAMENT WOULD NOT EXIST. TO THOSE WHO HAVE HELPED IN THE PAST – THANK YOU! TO THOSE WHO ARE SIGNING UP FOR THE FIRST TIME – WELCOME ABOARD. THIS BRIEF NEWSLETTER WILL HELP EXPLAIN THE VARIOUS VOLUNTEER DUTIES AND PROVIDE OTHER IMPORTANT INFORMATION.
SOME OF YOU HAVE ALREADY RAISED YOUR HAND TO VOLUNTEER ON SEPTEMBER 6, BUT TO MAKE SURE WE KEEP THE NUMBERS STRAIGHT AND ARE ALL ON THE SAME PAGE, PLEASE – ANTYONE WHO WANTS TO VOLUNTEER – TAKE TIME TO DO THE FOLLOWING:
SEND AN EMAIL TO VOLUNTEER CAPTAIN ERIN GIZIO egizio@preston-ct.org AND CC TO GARY YOUNG, COMMITTEE CHAIR rgaryyoung@att.net. IF ANY QUESTIONS ARISE YOU CAN CONTACT ERIN AT 860-230-8006 OR GARY AT 860-608-3674. PROVIDE YOUR CONTACT INFORMATION AND MAKE SURE YOUR EMAIL CLARIFIES “I CAN STAY ALL DAY” – OR “I CAN ONLY STAY UNTIL______”, OR “I CANNOT ARRIVE UNTIL _______” NOTE: ANYONE WHO SENDS A VOLUNTEER EMAIL AFTER WE HAVE REACHED OUR VOLUNTEER LIMIT WILL BE PLACED ON A LIST AND INVITED TO VOLUNTEER IN CASE SOMEONE ELSE HAS TO WITHDRAW
REGISTRATION, PUTTING CONTEST, SILENT AUCTION, SALE OF RAFFLE TICKETS ALL START AT 9AM…SO, PLEASE ARRIVE AT NORWICH GOLF COURSE FOR A QUICK VOLUNTEER MEETING AT 8:30. ALL VOLUNTEERS WILL BE PROVIDED COFFEE AND PASTRIES TO START, A BOX LUNCH – AND IF YOU ARE STAYING TIL THE END, A GREAT TASTING BUFFET AT END OF PLAY.
NUMBER OF VOLUNTEERS NEEDED: 20 +/- AND WHERE THEY ARE NEEDED
- ONE VOLUNTEER AT REGISTRATION TABLE TO HELP PAULA AND HER MOM
- TWO VOLUNTEERS AT PUTTING CONTEST
- ONE VOLUNTEER TO SERVE AS GUARDIAN OF SILENT AUCTION AND RAFFLE ITEMS
- EIGHT VOLUNTEERS: TWO AT EACH OF THE FOUR PAR 3 TEE OFF AREAS
- EIGHT VOLUNTEERS: TWO AT EACH OF THE FOUR PAR 3 GREENS
VOLUNTEER DUTIES:
- REGISTRATION TABLE: ASSIST PAULA AND MOM BY MAKING SURE ALL GOLFERS RECEIVE A GOODY BAG; MAKING SURE ALL GOLFERS ARE REMINDED OF PUTTING CONTEST; MAKE SURE ALL GOLFERS ARE OFFERED A CHANCE TO PURCHASE RAFFLE TICKETS – AND POINT OUT THAT SILENT AUCTION AND RAFFLE ITEMS ARE ON THE DECK JUST OUTSIDE THE RESTAURANT; HELP MAKE SURE ALL GOLFERS ARE OFFERRED A CHANCE TO PURCHASE STRINGS/MULLIGANS. RAFFLE TICKETS WILL BE 10 TICKETS FOR $10 OR AN ARMS LENGTH FOR $20. MONEY FROM SALE OF RAFFLE TICKETS SHOULD BE TURNED OVER TO JIM DALY. PURCHASED RAFFLE TICKETS ARE TO BE HANDED OVER TO VOLUNTEER WHO IS GUARDIAN OF SILENT AUCTION AND RAFFLE ITEMS ON THE DECK
- PUTTING CONTEST: STARTS AT 9AM – ENDS AT 9:50AM. 3 PUTTS FOR $10. MEASURE ANY PUTTS THAT GET CLOSER TO HOLE THAN PREVIOUS PUTTS; WRITE DOWN NAME/PHONE NUMBER AND DISTANCE TO HOLE FOR EACH CLOSER PUTT UNTIL WE END UP WITH A WINNER. WINNER SPLITS THE POT WITH ROTARY. IN THE EVENT OF A TIE, ROTARY STILL KEEPS 50% AND REMAINING 50% IS SPLIT EVENLY. WHOEVER IS HANDLING THE MONEY – TURN IT OVER TO JIM DALY ALONG WITH WINNER INFO WHEN CONTEST IS OVER. NOTE: GOLFERS CAN PUTT AS MANY TIMES AS THEY LIKE AS LONG AS THEY KEEP PAYING THE $10 FOR 3 PUTTS.
- GUARDIAN OF SILENT AUCTION AND RAFFLE ITEMS: THE EASY PART IS KEEPING AN EYE ON THINGS DURING TOURNAMENT PLAY. DURING PLAY ONE WINNING RAFFLE TICKET WILL BE DRAWN FOR EACH RAFFLE ITEM. WINNING TICKET NUMBERS WILL BE POSTED ON RAFFLE POSTER. NOTE: WHEN TOURNAMENT IS OVER THERE WILL BE A SHORT INTERVAL WHEN GOLFERS CAN CONTINUE TO BID ON SILENT AUCTION ITEMS – AT WHICH TIME THEY CAN REVIEW RAFFLE POSTER AND CLAIM THEIR PRIZE. IT WILL ALSO BE YOUR JOB TO REVIEW SILENT AUCTION BIDDING SHEETS TO MAKE SURE PEOPLE ARE WRITING DOWN THEIR BIDS, THEIR NAMES AND THEIR PHONE NUMBERS AS LEGIBLY AS POSSIBLE. AFTER BUFFET, ALL BIDDERS WILL CHECK TO SEE IF THEY HAD THE HIGHEST BID – AND WINNERS WILL PAY FOR THEIR AUCTION ITEM WITH CASH, CHECK OR CREDIT CARD
- VOLUNTEERS ON THE COURSE – TEE OFF AREA. YOUR JOB WILL BE TO THANK FOLKS FOR PLAYING TODAY AND SELL THEM A “HIT THE GREEN” TICKET FOR $5. IF A GOLFER WHO HAS PAID THE $5 LANDS HIS DRIVE ON THE GREEN, HE RECEIVES A TICKET AND WILL BE ENTERED INTO A DRAWING – WINNER SPLITS THE POT WITH ROTARY. TICKETS AND MONEY SHOULD BE HANDED OVER TO JIM DALY AFTER PLAY IS OVER. NOTE: YOU WILL HAVE ACCESS TO A GOLF CART FOR BATHROOM BREAK IF NEEDED
- VOLUNTEERS ON THE COURSE – AT THE GREEN: YOUR JOBS WILL INCLUDE: 1) GIVING A THUMBS UP WHEN A GOLFER LANDS HIS DRIVE ON THE GREEN(THIS WAY THE VOLUNTEERS AT TEE OFF AREA WILL KNOW TO HAND OUT A “HIT THE GREEN” TICKET); 2) THIS IS SUPER RARE – BUT KEEP AN EYE OUT FOR ANY HOLE IN ONE; 3) EACH PAR 3 HAS A “CLOSEST TO THE PIN” PRIZE – SO, MAKE SURE GOLFERS WHO LAND CLOSE TO THE HOLE MEASURE THEIR DISTANCE TO HOLE AND WRITE DOWN THEIR NAME/CELL PHONE AND DISTANCE IF IT IS CLOSER THAN PREVIOUSLY RECORDED DISTANCE. A POSTER AND TAPE MEASURE SHOULD BE AT EACH GREEN; 4) THANK THE GOLFERS FOR PLAYING TODAY. YOU WILL HAVE ACCESS TO A GOLF CART FOR BATHROOM BREAK IF NEEDED
THANK YOU!!