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President Tom called our meeting to order today at The St. Catharines Golf & Country Club. Joining the President at the head table:
- Speaker Introducer: Kim Widdicombe
- Speaker: Vanessa Fralick
- Sgt-at-Arms: Larry Iggulden
- Member: Karen McKee-Mazier
- Registrar: Ross MacDonald
Grace: Bill Williams
O Canada: Don Shaw
Toast to the Queen and Canada: by President Tom
Ross MacDonald
- Visiting Rotarian John Boot from Summerland BC with the Classification of Food Processing;
- Paul MacDonald, guest of Rotarian Doug Foss;
- Cindy Mewhinny, guest of Rotarian Walter Sendzik; and,
- Steven Teyenhuis, guest of Rotarian Glen Norton.
None to Celebrate! Some attempted to sing anyway…
Membership Committee Meeting August 21, 5:00 pm at the George Darte Funeral Home
Seniors Committee will meet at Versacare on August 20 at 5:00 pm
TV Auction will meet at MacGillivray Partners LLP on August 20 at 5:00 pm
Kelly Buckley announced that our Out Student, James Foote has returned from Finland; our new In Student, Mr. Matsumoto, will be arriving on Saturday August 25 and anyone who can speak or knows someone who can speak Japanese should contact Kelly. In addition, our local Blood Bank is getting very low and could use your help.
President Wilf Wilkinson will be speaking at a Terry Fox fund raising dinner on November 5; $200 per plate and $100 for Rotarians.
$596.50 – George Doty had the ticket but drew the Jack of Diamonds.
Collected by Phil Porter.
Phil was happy to have completed the 163 km ride last Thursday and Friday. During the ride Rachel thanked him for providing shade and following the ride his wife Lorraine remarked on seeing a picture of Phil standing with Doug Geddie that together they looked like the number 10! Finally, Phil’s surgery on Saturday to remove his bicycle seat was successful.
John Crossingham was very happy ($21) to announce the wedding of his daughter and the birth of a new grand daughter (Isla) to his son and daughter in law the same day. A tidal wave of happiness – a tsunami of celebration… In addition, John noticed a bumper sticker the had an eye, a heart and a bull and was delighted to interpret that this person loved politicians until he read the fine print proclaiming that they loved beef!
Dave Feasby was happy that he and his wife April made the ride along with Phil.
Peter Kudreikis was happy to announce his 6th grandchild.
Betty-Lou was happy to recognize the leadership of the Walker Family through their donation of $5,000,000 to the new Oncology Centre.
Coletta McGrath had a wonderful 2-week vacation in Ireland trying to keep up to her mother. She had lunch with the Rotary Club of Ennis, County Claire and presented President Tom with heir banner.
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Preident Tom and Coletta McGrath
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Rick Vanderkuip was happy that the winery had an excellent Rib Fest. He was also very happy to announce that we have sold out of our Rotary Ice Wine.
Rachel was happy to thank Phil more for his humour than his shade on the ride and noted that they rode from 1:05 to 7:00 pm on Thursday and again from 7:30 am to 1:00 pm on Friday! Quite an endeavor by all 6 participants (Rachel, Phil, Dave and April, Chris and Doug).
Niagara Symphony Children’s Program – Vanessa Fralick
Kim Widdicombe introduced Vanessa, one of her former skaters at the Winter Club. Vanessa was our Out Student (Linz, Austria) in 2002. She graduated from St. Catharines Collegiate in 2004 with Honours (90+) and has gone on to her study of Orchestral Trombone at the University of Toronto. She has completed 3rd year and will take her next year on an exchange at McGill. Currently, she is the Assistant Director of the Niagara Youth Orchestra’s (NYO) Summer Camp at Ridley College.
Vanessa began by discussing “The Mozart Effect” where brain activity can be increased through music. (Ed note: Wikipedia’s reference is as follows. "The Mozart effect refers to disputed scientific studies that test a theory suggesting that classical music increases brain activity more positively than other kinds of music, and that listening to certain kinds of complex music may induce a short-lived (fifteen minute) improvement in the performance of certain kinds of mental tasks known as "spatio-temporal reasoning". Two pieces of Mozart's music; Sonata for Two Pianos in D Major (K. 448) and Piano Concerto No. 23 (K. 488), were found to have this effect. Later research also suggested that K. 448 could reduce the number of seizures in people with epilepsy.” Vanessa believes that music is a catalyst to the creative process.
The NYO Camp began operations 42 years ago (in 1965) for strings. Today it encompasses strings, brass, woodwinds, percussion and voice. Vanessa has been in the camp program either as student or staff for 9 years; her first orchestral experience was with harp; NYO also afforded her first audition experience. She believes that the camps teach the students how to work together in a collaborative non-competitive atmosphere. Students can enroll at 4 years of age and will gain keyboard and rhythm experience. At 6 and 7 years they will be taught recorder. Other exposure includes orchestral, jazz and the new ‘School of Rock’.
Vanessa quickly described the many other programs provided by the NYO including the Academy programs and the Leader in Training Programs. She explained that the camps exist through the generosity of HRDC and other grants in addition to student fees.
: Ross MacDonald
Ross remarked on the ease of delivery, composure and clarity Vanessa possessed in her presentation today. He applauded the dedication of the NSO, the NYO and their director, Danial Swift. He noted that our Rotary Club has been a supporter of the Camp Program in the past. He thanked Vanessa very much for her presentation.
President Tom also thanked Vanessa and explained that our Club would be presenting an Elementary School with a dictionary on her behalf to support Literacy in Niagara.
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Vanessa Fralick and President Tom
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The Happy $ Grandchild Traditions.
On December 18, 1924 we instituted the top hat tradition where a new grandparent would wear the club top hat for the duration of the meeting (the top seems to have gone missing but this would be a great one to resurrect).
President Larry Smith started the $1 per pound tradition in 1977, a tradition that continues today.
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1987-88 Exchange Student Shoja Ahsan Family Visit with Jayne and Rick Evans
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Valerie Jaeger – Brock University Student Health Services
• ROTARY District Newsletter for June is now available at http://www.rotary7090.org/pdfs/districtnews/DN0706.pdf
• The 9th annual FACS Fall Gala is being held at White Oaks on Friday October 12th . For more info, or to book tickets, call 905 937-7731 ext 3304
• The annual MS Bike Tour takes place in Niagara on August 26th. There are 40 and 75km routes along the Niagara Parkway. Call 1 800 268-7582 for more details, or register at msbiketours.com
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