This Week in

September 11th, 2019 Meeting of the Wagner Rotary Club convened at noon. Presiding over the meeting was President Bill Frei who asked Pastor Bill Herrmann to offer up prayer. Pastor Bill asked for strengthening of all those who are coping with the recent rain and flooding and a blessing on all the Wagner Rotarians to continue to do the Lord’s work in our community.

There were no guests for the day, so Ken Cotton took the podium for a Membership Minute on Honorary Membership in Rotary. “Honorary” is one of four types of membership a person may have in a Rotary club. This type of membership is the highest distinction a Rotary club can confer and is exercised only in exceptional cases to recognize an individual for unusual service and contributions to Rotary and society. An honorary member is elected for one year only, and continuing membership must be renewed annually.

Honorary members cannot propose new members to the club, do not hold office and are exempt from attendance requirements and club dues.

Many distinguished heads of state, exploders, authors, musicians, astronauts and other public personalities have been honorary members of Rotary clubs, including King Gustaf of Sweden, King

George VI of England, King Baudouin of Belgium, King Hassan III of Morocco, Sir Winston Churchill, humanitarian Albert Schweitzer, Charles Lindbergh, composer Jean Sibelius, explorer Sir Edmund Hillary, Thor Heyerdahl, Thomas Edison, Walt Disney, BobHope,Dr.AlbertSabin,British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and many of the presidents of the United States. Truly, those selected for honorary membership are those who have done much to further the ideals of Rotary.

Rotarian Laurie Kidd led the club members in singing “On Rotarians” with rotary words to the tune of “On Wisconsin”. The club does a tremendous job of singing when Laurie leads us with the piano.

Jordan Weber was the lucky ticket holder to try to win the Queen of Hearts drawing but he drew a 6 of Spades and won a lottery ticket as a consolation.

Secretary/Treasurer Patty Frei reported that $18.00 had been collected for the day bringing the total to $884.00

Patty announced that the attendance race is very close: Pastor Bill had 1 missing Rotarian with a total of 11 and Pastor Laurie had 3 misses with a total of 11. There are only two more Rotary meetings left in the first quarter. Everyone should try to attend or make up their absence or be prepared to buy the opposing team a steak dinner!

Secretary Patty reported that we would be receiving $6,500.00 in grant money for our project at the baseball field. We will have to provide some matching funds.

President Bill announced the programs coming up were Gerrit Juffer for September 18th which Roger Wiltz will substitute for Gerrit; Gerrit will have September 25th, and Ken Cotton is in line for the October 2nd meeting.

Pastor Laurie Kidd was the program chair for the meeting, and she presented a very moving program on September 11, 2001. She shared an article which contained many facts and figures pertaining to the terrible day in our history. She called on several people to recall where they were and what they were doing the moment they found out the news about the planes crashing into the twin towers in New York.

The club adjourned by singing “Let There Be Peace on Earth” and then our usual song “America”.