Anthony Landi gave the inspiration: Anthony shared some of deserving organizations who have been awarded grants this year totally $57,350 by the Providence Rotary Charities Foundation. He highlighted a few: Camp Surefire Foundation to support camperships for Children and Youth living with Type 1 Diabetes program, Clothes to Kids RI, Inc to support school appropriate wardrobes at no cost to children in K-12 living in poverty. Katie Brown Educational Program to support relationship violence education in the Providence Public Schools, RISE to support mentoring and wrap around Support for children of incarcerated parents, and Sojourner House to support Camp Eureka, the free week-long summer camp for childen, ages 5 to 17 who have witnessed violence in their homes.
Members on Zoom
Our apologies to members on Zoom as we lost internet connection during the meeting.
Visiting Rotarians
Hardeep Saluja from Weatherford, Oklahoma Rotary Club. He is President-Elect of his club. He brought his nephew to the meeting, Singh Saluja who is interested in joining our club.
Other Guests
Sheri Hendricks and Chris Stevenson, both are prospective new members of our club. And Matt Spoehr from the Small Business Association.
Announcements
President Pete announced the ongoing drive for school supplies for September at the Harry Kizirian School. Mary Brewster is organizing this drive for $50 per classroom for classes. He encouraged Rotarians to donate to this great cause! Checks can be made out to the Providence Rotary Club or you can put on a credit card with Rob.
Art Norwalk announced that this coming week will be Reading Week at the George J. West Elementary on Tuesday, May 27 and Thursday, May 28 to read stories to the children. Please let Art and Jane know if you would like to participate.
Past President, Holly Applegate announced the upcoming 115th Installation of Officers and Directors at the Squantum Club on Tuesday, July 1. Flyers were put on the tables and were sent out to everyone through Club Runner. You can register via the link in the SideBar below. Please select your meal choice by June 20th.
Happy Bucks
- Bill Applegate gave 5 Happy Bucks for going to the Mets-Red Sox Game on Monday, but leaving early because of the cold temperature with the Sox winning. The Red Sox ultimately won!
- Kris David gave 5 Happy Bucks for her 50th Reunion in Holland, Michigan and happy to survive a passing tornedo. Also for Alex David who got cast in the filming of a new Apple-Plus TV show.
- Cap Willey gave 2 Happy Bucks for his oldest granddaughter’s graduation and her new job as an Art History Major.
- Pete 10 Happy Bucks because he woke up happy and decided to stay happy and to a part of Rotary each week as we welcome new members and fill the tables.
- Anxhela Elezaj gave Happy Buck for her father’s Birthday and for taking her CFA Level two exam.
Speaker
Past President Don Saracen introduced our speaker, Luther Spoehr. He received his Ph.D. in history from Stanford University. He is Senior Lecturer Emeritus in Education and History at Brown University, where his courses include seminars on the history of intercollegiate athletics, colleges, and universities in the 60’s and the history of academic freedom. Among his many publications, he has written over 120 book reviews on American History for the Providence Journal (back when the Projo had an actual Books section). A longtime member of the Board of Trustees for the Rhode Island Historical Society, he served as Chairman of the Board from 2017 through 2020. He and his wife, Kathy, have lived in Rhode Island since 1974. Their older son, Matt recently was a speaker at our club in February about the SBA.
Luther spoke about Rhode Island’s Gilded Age in the last quarter of the 19th Century with emerging big business, super-rich entrepreneurs, obsession with developing industry making RI an Industrial Powerhouse. In 1900, Rhode Island was the wealthiest state in the country per capita known for its prominence in textile and precision tool making with companies such as Gorham Manufacturing for silver and jewelry (now part of Textron) and Brown and Sharpe with machine tools.
Nelson Aldrich, a famous resident of RI was known as the General Manager of the United States lived in the well-known residence in Warwick called the Aldrich Mansion. He made many family connections with influential people such as John Rockefeller.
Immigration coming into RI brought non-English speaking of Irish and French Canadians brought workers into Rhode Island factories. Interestingly, the population of Providence in 1900 is about the same as today - 175,000 in 1900 and 179,000 today.
George J West Presentation
Halley and John Rocco, children book authors and illustrators, presented to the classes of George J. West on Wednesday morning. They highlighted the books that were donated via the auction at the Legends for Literacy Gala held last October. The children were attentive audiences.
One interesting fact was found by John Rocco via an online search that intersects with our Literacy Project. The man, George J West, was a lawyer in Providence who was also interested in literacy. "A brilliant and magnetic advocate, he was one of the staunchest and most valuable friends of the public schools. He also fought over his shortened life to provide free textbooks to the children in the Providence Schools."