Bill and Maggie are visiting in USA.

 

Trudy is serving at the Memorial Arena vaccination clinic.(Picture bellow compliments of Trudy)

 

President Gerry gtjanssen@gmail.com (etransfer of cheque) wants your tulip order sooner than later; the maximum numbers available for purchase is 500, so don’t miss out. The ordering closes end July. $25 buys 25 bulbs per package which will arrive Sep/Oct 21. Ron wants some as prizes for our next fundraiser.

 

Malcolm announced the following opportunity about seminars sponsored by the St Thomas Elgin General Hospital Foundation. The Hospital Foundation knows how to use social media; maybe whoever set up their social media could help our club.

 

The Rotary International Convention is virtual this year; see https://convention.rotary.org/en .

 

On December 1, 1991 I became a member of the Rotary Club of Aylmer, part of the greatest organization in the world.

Joe Mennill, Past District Governor and the driving force behind the establishment of the Ontario Police College, had approached my husband, Bob, about becoming a Rotarian. He also mentioned it to me in passing. It was early days for welcoming women into Rotary. No longer did we have to accept secondary status as a RotaryAnn.  So on the night of November 25, 1991, I joined Marie Louise Borm and Shirley Fallowfield as the first three women inducted into the Rotary Club of Aylmer. The Borms had been active in Rotary for many years, attending international conventions and hosting Youth Exchange students. Marie Louise had accompanied Etienne to meetings following an industrial accident which left him with some brain damage. Certainly not enough to keep him home or to prevent him from expounding on any number of topics. Until the Aylmer club relinquished its charter, Marie Louise was an active member of the club.

 

Back in those days our club had a couple dozen members and some large annual projects, the least favourite of mine being Joe’s pet project, Easter Seals. From stuffing envelopes in his basement to canvassing the entire town door to door begging for donations, Easter Seals was a major fund raiser.

The Farmers’ Banquet required more man hours than I care to imagine and brought some incredible speakers to the town. We renamed it the Rural/Urban night in an attempt to bring farmers and consumers together but every project has its best before date and the banquet was quietly retired in the early 2000’s.

 

A major fundraiser was dumped in our laps when some irregularities in tallies brought the Aylmer Fair Board to us, asking if we would take over “manning” the Aylmer Fair Gates. We have many of the St. Thomas members to thank for your support over the years in this undertaking. My favourite shift was 8am – 1pm on Elk St. I was guaranteed to get in several hours of reading under the trees. The fair went from three days to four days to five days back to four days and we were there collecting entrance fees and parking fees and putting a friendly face on Rotary in our town.

 

The annual Rotary Christmas Concert brought together choirs from all the elementary schools and churches in Aylmer. It was a wonderful evening to bring in  the start of the Christmas season. Unfortunately, it fell victim to falling numbers in churches and falling budgets for music programs in the schools.

I first became president for the 1999-2000 year with our first female District Governor, a fact that was announced at every opportunity. We are seeing this phenomenon today with Jennifer Jones as RIPE. I always felt that women would really have made progress when a person’s gender no longer merited mention. 

That was the year, I’m sure Bill will remember, that we did the most amazing play for the millennium District Conference in Goderich in the middle of a hurricane-force storm and finished our performance after all the food had been devoured by those in the audience. But it was a great time.

 

During those years our family hosted several Youth Exchange students, most memorably Peter Petersen from Denmark with whom we are still in touch. Not so much with the kleptomaniac from Japan or Oh King from the Philippines who was under the impression that I was the house maid.

In 2001 I first took the position of District Group Study Exchange Chair, a position I held for 3 years, the most interesting being in 2003 in the midst of SARS. We had an exchange with the Philippines, a hot bed of SARS infections as was Toronto. It became apparent quite early on that this exchange was not going to happen but RI was insistent that there was no problem while I couldn’t get host families or even team members. Within a week of having contacted RI the exchange was postponed and eventually rescheduled for the following year.

 

2007 was a great year – I took a GSE team to Australia. The experience was unforgettable and life changing for the entire team. While perhaps the culture shock was not what would have been experienced had we gone to India or Brazil, it was like stepping back in time 20 years. Within the Rotary experience I found the most surprising thing was that many of the Australian clubs did not provide any financial support whatsoever to The Rotary Foundation. I was unable to discover the real reason but there was a total disconnect between the Foundation and many clubs. We can be incredibly proud of our annual contributions and the good works they facilitate.

As a club we undertook a number of large projects:  The Grind Skate Park in Aylmer and another in Vienna, the local splash pad in Balmoral Park, and the sugar shack in Springwater Conservation Area.  These were all accomplished with financial assistance of the Ontario Trillium Foundation.

 

For the next few years Bob and I tossed the Presidential orb back and forth until we fumbled and the Rotary Club of Aylmer relinquished its charter.  It was a sad day.

But I cannot not be a Rotarian.  So I was very happy to be welcomed as a member of this Rotary Club.  It is so important to me to be part of an organization composed of good people who live by a code of ethics that is second to none.  I am proud to be a Rotarian; Rotary gives me opportunities to share my good fortune with those who are less fortunate; and Rotary allows me to work with and play with great people who are an important part of my life.  So thank you to Rotary, the Rotary Club of St. Thomas, and to my fellow Rotarians.

Thank you Barbara for being an Inspiration!

The Aylmer club met regularly with the Rotary Club of St Thomas at Christmas and the Tillsonburg Club.

Nancy reminded Barbara about the Shelter Box program. Barbara said the one she has repacks into a much larger space than when shipped.

Gerry reported the first female District Governor was Judy Crawford of Goderich who went into action about the same time as Barbara.

 

Our May 19th noon Zoom will focus on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion as it relates to Honouring Indigenous Persons and Economic Development in our communities. We will also have a update on Hand Up, supporting countries in need (link to follow). Also, see the link to the Thornbury Rotary Club initiatives on inclusion https://www.facebook.com/410700012392367/posts/3600207676774902/.

 

President Gerry – 5May is the anniversary of the Liberation of Holland.

Barbara – Her father was part of the Canadian Forces in Holland at that time.

Ron – His mother was born on 4May and would have been 100 years old.

Nancy – There is a Dutch Rembrandt at the National Gallery, Ottawa; that is an honour for Canada.

She is waiting for the “all Clear” to go to the cottage.

Malcolm – First grandchild’s (of 9) birthday. We are fortunate to have Barbara as President Elect.

Stew – His transplants are in a holding pattern waiting for the garden to warm up. Stew and Trish are also waiting of the “all clear” to go glamping in their new trailer.

Barbara – Norfolk County has a COVID snitch telephone line.

Trish – It was a sad day when Aylmer club laid down their charter, but it has been our gain. Many thanks for all the work completed by Barbara and Mary as members of this club.