President Jeff Hagstrom welcomed all to the December 15th meeting of the Brattleboro Rotary Club held at the American Legion in Brattleboro. George Weir offered a meaningful invocation in which he recited Robert Frost’s poem, “Christmas Trees”. This was followed by the pledge of allegiance.Birthday greetings were extended to: Phil Steckler.
As a luncheon supplied of chicken with blue cheese sauce, pork loin, broccoli, mashed potatoes, salad, chickpeas with squash, and apple betty with chocolate pudding for dessert was being digested, the meeting continued.
Guests: Dee Dee Jones.
TRIVIA QUESTION
Where was the first documented use of a tree at Christmas?
(answer below)
JOKE / SONG OF THE WEEK
For our Rotary song, Jenifer Ambler led us in a rousing rendition of "Deck the Halls".
ROTARY MINUTE
For our Rotary Minute, Marty Cohn told the club about USA Dictionary Project, a project started from a shared dream between two Rotarians. In 2001 it became a Matching Grant project between India D3150 and five clubs in Southern Colorado lead by the Lamar Rotary club. These five Rotary clubs distributed 1800 books the first year. Sence our start over 120 service clubs, including Rotary, Lion's, Kiwanis and Sertoma clubs in Sixteen states and American Samoa participated and distributed 375,000 hard-cover dictionaries worth over $7,500,000.00!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
At our December 29th meeting, George Anthes will tell a joke or lead us in song, while Chuck Cummings delivers a Rotary Minute.
UPCOMING PROGRAMS
12/22 — No club meeting. Merry Christmas!
12/29 — Presented by Jeff Morse, Aida Avdic will talk about her family’s journey coming here as a refugee from Bosnia.
01/05/17 -- Presented by Katja Matthews, Rev. Lise Sparrow will discuss the current refugee situation in Vermont
01/12 -- Presented by John Meyer, Alex Beck will talk about job creation
01/19 – Presented by Roger Miller, John Hagen, Meeting Waters YMCA.
01/26 – Presented by Fred Moriarty, a panel discussion on how the Holstein addition came to be
02/02 – Presented by Bill McKim, Jim Anderson with sing show tunes
02/09 – Club Assembly, TBA
NOTE: Weekly assignments (program, joke, and Rotary minute) are posted on club’s website.
FINES
NONE ;-(
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Ugliest Christmas Tie contest was won by Cheri Ann Brodhurst
Presentation of appreciation check to our American Legion servers.
Sr. Gifts committee is wrapping up its work.
Christmas Tree sale – 300 sold; 100 to go. We have now broken even!
Next Overflow Shelter meal will be on 12/19. See Stan Nowakowski for more info.
Don’t forget to wish Bill Vermouth a speedy recovery.
Last posting for Chris Bocell
BRAGS
Dave Twombly – for two Gateway Scholarship recipient who bought Christmas trees.
Al Jerard – for Stephen Stearns and NEYT’s production of Mary Poppins.
Phil Steckler – for Chris Bocell’s Christmas tree salesmanship.
Cindy Jerome – for the person who used her credit card but had the toys sent to Cindy. (Cindy donated to Toys for Tots).
Gina Pattison – for Jerry Theberge’s mouth guard.
Mara Williams – for the hand delivery of her 2017 Richards Group calendar.
George Weir – for Cheri Ann Brodhurst putting in an extra 3.5 hour Christmas tree sales shift.
George Weir – for Phil Steckler’s Christmas outfit.
Jeff Hagstrom – for Phil Steckler’s Christmas outfit
PROGRAM:
Marcy Jones and his wife, Dee Dee, talked about their 54 day trip across America to Alaska and back.
REMINDERS
Bottles and cans can be brought to Putney Road redemption center to benefit Pure Water for the World. Please see Mara Williams.
Thank Marty Cohn for producing this newsletter. To date, only President Jeff has bragged.
This bulletin was respectfully submitted by Past President Martin Cohn who attempts to give a gist of the meeting. However, it is always better to attend. If you have any complaints about the contents of this bulletin....
ANSWER TO TRIVIA QUESTION
The first documented use of a tree at Christmas and New Year celebrations is argued between the cities of Tallinn in Estonia and Riga in Latvia! Both claim that they had the first trees; Tallinn in 1441 and Riga in 1510. Both trees were put up by the 'Brotherhood of Blackheads' which was an association of local unmarried merchants, ship owners, and foreigners in Livonia (what is now Estonia and Latvia).
