|
|
|
The Rotary Club of
Space Center (Houston), Texas, and U.S.A.
Rotary
International District 5890 (589)
Club 2010
Chartered August 6,
1964
"Service Above
Self"
Blastoff
Down History Lane
Edition
January
3, 2011
No Meeting
Today
Click Calendar for Club meetng dates
in January
Our
Presidents
We are now in the 47th year of the
club’s history with 46 persons serving as
presidents. Three of our members have also been District
589 (5890) Governors. As club historian, I have the
privilege of “getting to know” the Presidents either by
interview or by artifacts from their tenure. I have come
to realize that each, with her or his unique education,
experience, and leadership characteristics, was a successful
leader and each help shape our Club into one of the most
admired and respected clubs in Rotary today. Under their
leadership our Club members have generated and given back to
the local and international communities over $1,400,000 since
1964 not to mention the time freely given to mentoring;
professional seminars; fix up, paint up, and clean up
community projects; visiting and helping senior citizens and
people who are physical handicapped and/or mentally retarded;
clean water projects and orphanages; giving life back to
severely burned children and eye sight to the
blind.
We are fortunate to have pictures of each of our
presidents and district governors, so let’s visit each one of
these outstanding Rotarians in a photo
review. Further, most of the President’s
Rotary year history are complete and can be viewed by
clicking on Presidents and looking to the upper right
corner of the page and select the year you would like to
visit.
Our Service
Heritage
Let’s go back 47 years to better understand the
“Service Above Self” passion which drove our founding members
to lay the foundation of service for our
Club.
From the 1964-65
history file: The community service program
of the club began almost immediately as the Space Center
Rotary Club began work to establish a public library (The
Theodore C. Freeman Memorial Library, in honor of the deceased
astronaut), in the Clear Lake area. Citizens of the area
along with the Club organized the library and established
temporary quarters in the Clear Lake City Recreation Center in
January 1965. Two thousand volumes were donated by
residents to help get the library started. The operation
was entirely voluntary, from staffing to funding.
Richard Veth and Richard Allen, members of Space Center
Rotary, were elected to the first Board of Trustees of Freeman
Memorial Library. Since that time, numerous Rotarians
and Rotary Anns (Rotarians' wives) have served on the Library
Board. Club members also participated in a variety of
projects at the library: renovating the building, changing of
partitions, constructing shelving, painting and
landscaping. There was also a repainting job on the
library by club members. Minutes of
the Club Assembly dated February 16, 1965 gives a more indepth
look into the Club's activities and plans. (Note:
The grammar has not been corrected. In addition,
Club member Vince
Lipovsky is one of
the 35 charter members of our
Club.)
A Quick
Glimpse at Our History
Many "special events"
have occurred over the past 47 years.
Unfortunately some of them are not in the history
record and consequently will not be placed in
the Club's history and archives. However many
of these have been identified and can be viewed by clicking
here. A more complete list is in
the Club's History under Special Occasions and
Recognitions.
| | |
