Welcome to an experiment!
The Tar Wheel has been the official newsletter of the Rotary Club of Asheboro, North Carolina, for more than fifty years. For much of that time it was printed by Durham Printing Company, address-o-graphed, and distributed by mail. The last three years it has been emailed to members after being written by the Tar Wheel staff and then designed, laid out and published by Cooper Thornton, with some help from the marketing department of First National Bank. The last six weeks, however, the distribution chain has broken down. Members haven’t received a Tar Wheel by email since early March, not because they haven’t been written, but because the publication phase takes some time, which Cooper hasn’t had.
After some discussion, Cooper directed me (Mac Whatley, Your Scribe today) to set up this blog through WordPress, which will allow Scriveners to post their notes on our Rotary meetings without waiting for prettification. WordPress offers the best blog software, and I’ve used it for a couple of months now to post my own online journals, mostly having to do with the my travels with Roman Bogdanov, my Russian foreign exchange student. Here is the link to my blog, FYI: macwhatley.wordpress.com . Roman actually is the one who first took the leap into blogdom, to avoid having to write separate letters to all his Russian friends and family. Here’s the link to his blog, but fair warning, it’s in Russian: hulkiliada.wordpress.com . Blogs allow comments from readers, so please comment! Here goes:
Asheboro was cool and rainy for the first Rotary meeting of May, but things were hopping inside AVS.
Past President Jim Rich, Chairman of the Scholarship Committee, led the Four Way Test, and President Prithi led us in the Pledge of Allegiance. Phil Shore, looking especially spiffy (I guess he primped to sit at the front table) led the way in being Thankful.
H.R. Gallimore welcomed guests Susan Milner and Tom Pugh; Steve Grove of BB&T and the Martinsburg, West Virginia club was making up and checking us out- he may be moving our way. Henry Trollinger introduced us to AHS students Trevor Wall (son of Terry and Merita, a member of the baseball and cross country teams; headed to NSCSU in engineering) and Jonathan Walker (son of Rick and Patricia, whose hobbies and interests are “hunting, fishing, church, helping little old ladies cross the road, rescuing babies from house fires, and saving cats that are stuck in trees”- maybe he needs to write for the Tar Wheel! Trevor has a tennis scholarship to Chowan where he will major in Christian ministries.) Besides those guys, we also had two tables of student scholarship winners from Asheboro, Southwest, and Randleman—see below!
Tom White announced that next week’s program would be the new gospel quartet “Capital City,” which includes retired SAMS band director Eddie Harrington.
Prithi says that a Professional Photographer will be present the next two weeks to take member photos for our online directory, designed to have a printed version in the future. Future President Carole Gilliam reminded the club of the 2nd annual Old Dominion Rotary Golf Tournament, at Mid Pines in Moore County- $500 a team with proceeds going to Boys and Girls Homes.
“Does meat have any medicinal value?” asks Prithi. Since this is Vegetarian Time, the answer is obviously NO. Many vegetables and herbs have been recognized for medicinal purposes for thousands of years (Oh, for instance: onion, garlic, grapes, hops, malt, barley, rye…. Just don’t add Melamine.)
The program is our annual scholarship presentation, and Jim Rich was the master of ceremonies.
Southwest Randolph guidance counselor Teresa Burton updated the club on the highlights of her school’s year, and introduced us to their three winners. Valeria Osipova, born in Russia, emigrated to Randolph County 6 years ago and lives on a farm in Tabernacle with her Russian mother and American father (and, in the interests of full disclosure, is a good friend of Your Scribe’s visiting Russian, Roman Bogdanov). Valeria will be attending UNC-G and wants to study music marketing so she can be a designer for a music recording label. Megan Sanders is the President of the FFA at SWR, which has 289 members. She will attend NCSU to study poultry science and veterinary medicine, with the intention of coming back to her family’s Randolph County farm “to help my Daddy” and her five siblings. Elizabeth Ritch will also be attending NCSU to study agricultural education, and also wants to return to her family farm, and would like to teach in the county schools. Both the horticulture and animal science programs at SW expanded this year (a new barn built, just in time for 9 goat kids born last week), so agriculture seems to be doing well at least in that corner of the county.
Jill Hays, guidance counselor at Randleman High introduced Michael Danford, who will be going to UNC-CH to study business, marketing and sales- right in line with his plan to be “an automobile industry entrepreneur.” Victor Oxendine will also be going to Chapel Hill to major in mechanical engineering and study criminal justice; he wants to work for a NASCAR racing team, so I hope that’s not a required double major.
Carolyn Fitch, AHS guidance counselor, waved the flag hard for AHS, not only reminding the club of athletic prowess (first undefeated season in football since 1982, Men’s Basketball conference tournament champs) but another Superior for the Band, with 2 students going to All-State Band and one going to Governor’s School; five students to All-State Chorus; 8 members of the class of 2007 with athletic scholarships, and one going to Princeton to run track. She touted the Blue Comet Academy, helping 8th graders to make the transition to high school, and the Zoo School, which will send 100 students and 4 teachers to study at the Zoo next year. Her winners: Elspeth Crawford, going to Chapel Hill to major in biology and Spanish, and who wants to attend medical school to be an OB/GYN; and Brittany Wright, Editor-in-Chief of the student newspaper Ash-Hi-Chat, going to Chapel Hill to major in English, and who hopes to go study law at Wake Forest after that.
