Norwich Rotary Club
March 27th, 2024
Location-Bella Fiore
THE RONE
Presiding: President Mary Richardson
Invocation: President-Elect Rodney Green
Fellowship: Barry Shead
Birthday’s: Theresa Madonna – March 30th
Anniversaries: Mary Richardson, March 30th-12 years. Mike Goldblatt, April 1 – 38 years. Jay Waitte, April 1 – 28 years.
Guests: Kevin Wickless introduced his son Jackson Wickless and his wife Cristin Wickless. Cristin Wickless has been approved for membership by the Board. 2nd posting. Kevin also introduced Margarita Martins-Querido. Barry Shead introduced James Hyman. Rodney Green introduced his lovely wife Lucille Green and a soon to be inducted Roz Etra. Jeff Brining introduced Chris LaRose. Jan from the Norwich Woman’s City Club also attended the meeting.
Visiting Rotarians: Chris LaRose – Norwich Sunrise Rotary
Barry began fellowship by reciting a news story from the 2009 February 12th edition of the Norwich Bulletin titled “Lincoln’s Legacy Runs through Norwich.” Norwich Rotarian and then President of the Norwich Historical Society Bill Champagne was quoted throughout the article about Lincoln’s visit to Norwich when he was running for President and a quest of then Governor Buckingham. The speech Lincoln gave that day was a reprise of the famous speech he made at Cooper Union a few days earlier.
Special Presentation: President Mary called Rodney Green forward to receive his Paul Harris +3 pin for his generous support of the Rotary Foundation. Congratulations Rodney!
Membership Minute: Stan Lucas suggested the club take a booth at the Rose Arts Festival this year. The event will take place on June 29th on Chelsea Parade in Norwich. More details to follow but volunteers will be needed to man the booth throughout the day. He also reminded that 4 new Rotarians will be inducted next week at our regular lunch meeting. Bring guests!!
Announcements:
President Mary had the following announcements:
The Whisky, Wine and Cigar event will be back again on May 1stat Bella Fiore. Edwin Muenzner, CPA has signed on as the Food Sponsor! Tickets are on sale now $75.00 per person. Don’t wait too long to reserve your tickets! This will sell out!
The Rotary “Day of Service” will be May 18th. Last year over 11,000 meals were packaged for the Gemma Moran- United Way Food Center. This year Area Rotary Clubs hope to package double that number! Mark your calendar now to donate a few hours of your time at the (NEW LOCATION) United Methodist Church in Gales Ferry. 10 Rotarians from our club are requested to help out on that day. 8:30am start!
Our area has a couple finalists in the 4-Way Test Speech Contest. April 20th will be the finals!
Native Son/Daughter Lunch will be on June 5th. Four finalists will be reviewed after today’s meeting and a recipient will be chosen.
Anyone knows of a Rotarian who has been ill, please let the Sunshine Committee know.
Anyone with spare clean egg cartons please give them to Bonnie Johnson to give to St. Francis Hospital. She brought cookies as an incentive to reward donors. Don’t forget to bring your clean egg cartons when you are finished with them!
Members are encouraged to fill out a donation form and donate to the Rotary Clock Project.
If you know of a speaker for one of our meetings, please contact Kevin Wickless or Alexis Kahn to get on the schedule.
June 19th will be our Rose Garden Luncheon.
June 26th will be our Change of Command Ceremony.
September 4th will be the Annual Golf Tournament! Mark your calendar now!
Happy Dollars: Mike Matera
Mike gave happy dollars to say how nice it is to see the room full today. Mike also congratulated Rodney on his Paul Harris +3 Award.
Bill Champagne mentioned a Facebook post that the Otis Library posted saying that they are going to name the Children’s Stage Area after Norwich Rotarian Lottie Scott. She will also be recognized the evening of their annual “Night with the Author” event. Bill also saw former Rotarian Bob Farwell and Bob send’s his best wishes to all. Bill also said he attended the Chestnut Street Playhouse play “Little Shop of Horrors” and said it was excellent!
Susy Hurlbert gave kudos to Jen Granger for the 335K grant award UCFS recently received. Also, ECAR his having a shredding event on May 18th. ECAR is also hosting a free event on the Fair Housing Month with a guest speaker on April 24th.
Stan Lucas passed around some interesting currency from Costa Rica. Stan just visited Costa Rica with a friend who needed to get away and they stayed at a resort directly on the ocean. So close that the sound of the waves kept him up at night! He also welcomed Kevin Wickless’ son Jackson!
Barry Shead was happy to have his granddaughter over to his house the night before. They played qa game that involved white balls and his granddaughter commented that the balls were the same color of his hair!
Mary Richardson just returned from a wonderful visit to London to visit her sister! She also congratulated Rodney on his PH+3!
Pat Marshall gave happy dollars in honor of last week’s speaker. She also said how important it is to have a living will and to set one up when you are healthy. Your family will thank you for it when the time comes!
Gary Young welcomed Lucille Green. He also found some corn-hole boards behind his house in Griswold that were still in good shape. He went to the store to buy some beanbags and was horrified that a set of 8 cost $48.00!
Rodney Green thanked everyone for their well wishes on his PH+3 Award. He welcomed Lucille. He’s happy with the way the Chestnut Street Playhouse is going as of late. Part of a very nice grant is now in their bank account and improvements to the theater will be started soon. He also said that the “Little Shop of Horrors” play was sold out on opening night for the first time in the theater’s history. He said he and Lucille are heading to Texas to visit family next week.
Roz Etra announced that the Jewish Federation is sponsoring a speaker that has first-hand accounts on the hostage situation in Gaza at Langley’s at 7pm tonight. It’s a free event.
Mike Cooney welcomed all our guests. He said that he cannot volunteer at the Rotary Food Stuffing Event on May 18th because he will be fishing with the Scouts that day. He hates fishing he said and would rather be stuffing food bags! He fixed his son’s broken eyeglasses with a piece from a Lego set! His daughter also has started softball.
Weekly Auction: Mary Richardson auctioned off some milk chocolate that she brough back from London! After some spirited bidding Andrew Nollman was the high bidder at $25.00!
Lottery: Bill Champagne
Rodney Green, Lucille Green and Mary Richardson could not find the Ace of Spades. Molly Bruno won Barry’s ARC cookies!
Program: No program today.
The 4-Way Test was led by Bonnie Johnson and the meeting was adjourned at 1:02pm.