The December 6th meeting of the Wagner Rotary Club began with a full house. We were led in prayer by Pastor/Rotarian Bill Heermann who gave thanks for such a beautiful weather day in December and gave thanks for our Advent time of preparing for the birth of our Savior.

Assistant Song Leader Jeff Doom led the members in singing two verses of Jingle Bells. We did a great job with that familiar tune. We also sang Happy Birthday for the December birthday people Patty Frei and Jeff Doom. Rotarian Patty Frei also gave the Membership Minute which was about the Rotary Foundation and the Paul Harris Fellow recognition. What is a Paul Harris Fellow? Established in 1957 Paul Harris Fellow recognition is given to individuals who contribute, or who have contributions made in their name of $1000 to the Annual Fund, Polio Plus, or an approved Foundation grant. Recognition consists of a certificate and pin.

Paul Harris Fellows can also be given on behalf of someone through Foundation Recognition points or through a combination of points and outright donations. Since the creation of the Paul Harris Fellow, over 1.6 million people have become Paul Harris Fellows including notable figures such as US President Jimmy Carter, Russian President Boris Yeltsin, and polio vaccine developer Jonas Salk.

The Wagner Rotary Club was honored to give out recognition pins to some of our fellow Rotarians. Amanda Bechen was a first-time recipient and Bill Frei was a Paul Harris Fellow plus 3 which means this is his third recognition pin. There is a picture of Paul Harris on the pin and a different color pin for every year of recognition. Contributions to the Foundation count towards becoming a recipient. These accumulate with contributions to Polio Plus, Foundation giving, and other Rotary worthwhile projects.

There were five WCS Seniors present, and they introduced themselves: Cyrus Davis whose parent is Twila Adair, and he is planning on attending SDSU to major in theatre. James Kessler’s parents are Regan Greger and Wendell Flying Hawk, and he is looking at Southeast Technical for a Mixed Media Course. Janae Robertson’s parents are Jenny and Jason Robertson, and she is considering Mitchell Technical Institute. Kohen Paulson’s parents are Shawn Paulson and Keri Bailey, and his future is not decided yet. Sapphire Simmons’s parent is Jeremy Simmons, and she is going to attend Southeast Technical College for Ultrasound.

Sergeant at Arms Jamie Soukup gleefully took his place at the podium as he had several fines: $2 to Becky Brunsing for weak bell ringing; $2 to Linda Soukup for mistakes in last week’s fines; $2 to Bill Frei for once again heckling the SAA; $2 to Jordan Weber for messing with the Sergeant’s book; $2 to Bryan Slaba for a picture; $2 to Jeff Doom for almost forgetting about the Rotary meeting and eating first. Happy Fines came from Jamie Soukup of $4 for being a member of the three out of five people at Rotary who won a championship in 2003 and also $2 for being beat up; $5 came from Jerry Henke who found $5 on the ground and used it to buy a Christmas card; $5 from Patty Frei who was pleased to see all the Christmas lights and the attendance at the Parade of Lights last week; $2 came from Rachel Woods who is a birthday buddy with the program John Podzimek.

The “Lucky Table” at Rotary once again had a chance at finding the Queen of Hearts. Jordan Weber was sitting at that table, and he had the lucky ticket number but only picked out the nine of Diamonds. The Queen drawing is now up to $304.00.

Football Book winners were Jenny Langdeaux and Neil Von Eschen sold by Jerry Henke. The attendance race is heating up once again. The Juffer Team has eight misses, and the Frei Team has Seven misses.

In other business Rotarians were informed that Wagner Economic Director Margaret Doom has arranged for a showing at the Wagner Theatre on January 3rd by the SDPTV which will be showcasing Wagner. They were in our community a few months ago filming and interviewing. The club consented to providing some refreshments to be served that evening at the theatre. Please watch the paper for future notices about this event.

Rotarian Bryan Slaba announced that our Christmas social was postponed due to conflicts by many members and a new date of December 27th has been set.

Rotarian Jordan Weber introduced his program which was John Podzimek, a Wagner native who graduated from WCS back in 2003. He never imagined being back in Wagner twenty years later. He has had a very interesting twenty years. Back when he was a student, he found himself graduating without any real future educational plans. He had always loved aviation and decided to join the Army. He went through basic training and studied aircraft electricity for helicopters. He was enticed by a program that would give $150 for every jump and went to airborne school. At Fort Bragg he worked in aviation/ mechanics and from there spent six years active duty in Honduras, South America and then back to Ft. Campbell in Kentucky. He did contract work from there in Pennsylvania, then Greenville, Texas; then to Iraq working for a company. He would spend sixty days overseas and then would be flown home for thirty days. He trained foreign nationals and then went to Dubai for two and half years. He then went to Ohio where he quickly tired of the traffic and dense population. He and his wife Whitney decided to come back to South Dakota. Whitney was the WGS Director for quite some time until the fire destroyed the facility. John was working at Poet in Scotland, and during this time he got his contractor’s license and eventually became his own boss after so many years of working for others. His company is known as “HELO Electric”. He showed the logo for his company on his shirt which consists of some helicopter blades. His love of aviation and helicopters was evident from his presentation. He is also a hard worker and a devoted family man with six children.

His program was so interesting, and we ran out of time. If you see John welcome him back to Wagner even though he has been here for a few years. It is heartwarming for all to see our young people come back to the community where they have been raised and settle down to become working members of our town.

We adjourned in our usual fashion.