Petoskey Rotary Noon Club NEWSLETTER 
August 13, 2025
103 Years of Service Above Self 

 

Welcome to the Rotary Club of Petoskey. President Andrea Coronado officiated the meeting. 
If you did not get the chance to attend, you can read about it in this newsletter. 

Pledge/Anthem:  Howard Richards led us in My Country tis of Thee

4-Way Test:  Bill Collins

Invocation:  Tim Dykstra

“We all have two lives. The second one starts when we realize we only have one.” Confucius

Calendar Winners:  Read off by Ian Straley

Calendar Winners August 13, 2025 

     
Prize
Cal#
Calendar Winner
City
Sold By
$50
1752
Karen Symonds
East Jordan
Petoskey
$50
1782
Drew Smith
Petoskey
Petoskey
$50
1497
Kaitlin Martin
Kalamazoo
Petoskey
$50
1303
Ryan Gilbert & Alyssa Ford
Grand Rapids
Dowagiac
$50
1539
Jim Fields
Downers Grove, IL
Petoskey

Visiting Rotarians:  Shirley Love, Cincinnati, OH, Dick Chambers, Holland, MI

Guests:  Vince Halek, Lloyann Curtis, Victoria Curtis; Speakers

Life Events:  None

Birthdays:  

Gary Baxter

Anniversaries:  

None

Singing/Song:  Howard Richards led us in Happy Birthday and Smile

ANNOUNCEMENTS

Save the Date – Upcoming Rotary Events

Meal Train for Sam Fee and baby:

Rotarian Sam Fee recently welcomed a new baby, and we’d love to help support her and her family in the coming weeks with meals, coffee, and words of encouragement for new parents.

They’re limiting gluten, dairy, and processed sugar, so please keep that in mind when planning. This is a casual meal train — simply pick a date on the SignUpGenius list (I’ve set up the next month) and drop Sam a quick note so she knows when to expect you. Instructions are on the sign up sheet.

No time to cook? Rotarian Sarah McDonnell of Little Bay Gourmet (231.622.5281) can prepare a hearty, diet-friendly meal for $40 and arrange delivery for an additional $5. No muss, no fuss — and baby and mom are cared for!
Sign Up for Sam’s Meal Train

Sunday, August 17
Rotary Social at Steve & Holly Brown’s Home
5:00–7:00 PM | 1859 Killarney Shores, Petoskey

Tuesday, September 9
Rotary Sunset Cruise – with members of other local Rotary clubs
Boarding: 7:00 PM | Petoskey Bayfront Park Marina
Cruise: 7:30–9:00 PM | $35/person | Cash bar available
Tickets will be added to your next invoice. Guests welcome.
https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C084DA4A92EA0FEC61-57940486-rotary

Wednesday, October 15
Rotary Third Wheel Social at Elder Piper 5:30-7:00
Theme: “Awkwardly Seeking Inclusion” – make a match, meet a friend, or fall in love with Rotary. Members drive.

Saturday, October 25
Film Screening – Join or Die – Time: TBD and will be announced
Crooked Tree Arts Center Theater
Followed by a welcome reception with local service clubs.

Rotary Youth Exchange Conference: - 9/5-9/7 at Camp Daggett. Our club has responsibility for Friday dinner (5-8pm) and Saturday lunch (11am-2pm). Reg will send out a signup sheet for light food prep and clean-up. 

The club is looking for a Care and Comfort chairperson.

Bear River Cleanup 8/16

The club is looking for STRIVE pizza buddies. See Andrea Coronado if you are interested.

Calendar Updates:  Calendar Launch Date – pick up your calendars Wednesday August 27th. Before meeting 11:30 to noon, after meeting 1:00 pm to 1:30 pm. If you are unable to pick up calendars, please arrange for someone else to pick up on your behalf. Contact Karen Ragland to make other arrangements. kmragland@charter.net  734 320 0424

Alzheimer’s Walk – September 27:  Join us in supporting the Alzheimer’s Walk this fall in Pennsylvania Park. Whether you walk, volunteer, sponsor, or donate—every step makes a difference. Connect with Ian Straley to get involved.

Coastal Crawl:  The Coastal Crawl is open-water swim held at Zorn Park in Harbor Springs. The individuals who have put it on for 30 years are retiring and are looking for individuals or organizations to take over the management of the event to keep it going in the future. This was suggested as a possible service opportunity for Rotary. This year, the Coastal Crawl is also looking for donations and volunteers. Contact Patrick O’Brien for more info. 

STRIVE Update:  Strive is looking for pizza sponsors and expanded support this year. We will hear more next week. 

Member Spotlight – None, 

PROGRAM:  Lloyann Curtis, Impact 100

Lloyann is the founding President, and her daughter Victoria, who also attended, is the founding Vice President. 
Impact100 is a women’s giving club started by Wendy Steele in 2001 in Cincinnati. It started as a community-based initiative but has now grown to 75 chapters in 4 countries. Each woman gives $1,000 and gifts are pooled together to give grants of a minimum of $100,000 to local non-profits.
The organization has given out $164M over the years. Clubs support 5 grant areas: education, arts & culture, family, health, and environment. Members serve on grant committees to recommend finalists and all members vote on the winning non-profits using rank-choice voting. Overhead expenses are covered by sponsors and evergreen members, who give an additional $100 annually.
Impact100 Little Traverse Bay launched in June 2024 as the73rd chapter.

Last week’s 2025 Annual Awards Dinner:
1.    Petoskey Harbor Springs Area Community Foundation - Lofts at Lumber Square - WINNER of $134,000
2.    Manna Food Project - Food Lockers - WINNER of $134,000
3.    Tip of the Mitt - new educational van
4.    Raven Hill - winterizing educational outbuildings 
5.    Great Lakes Chamber Orchestra - expand  the season, elevator GLCO profile, and build financial sustainability.

Goals for 2025:
1.    Grow to 300 members. 
2.    Encourage more non-profits to apply for Impact100 grants.

Signature Events
•    Meet the Finalists - June - open to the community.
•    Annual Awards Dinner - August - open to the community. 
•    Holiday Dinner - December - for members
•    Frequent social and networking events, especially in the summer.

Grant Workshops - for any non-profit to learn how to apply.

October 22 from 2-4pm @ Charlevoix Public Library

October 30 from 2-4pm @ Birchwood Country Club

To join Impact100 or to learn more about which non-profits are eligible to apply, visit https://impact100ltb.org/team/lloyann-curtis/

Next Week’s Program:  District Governor Mark Andresky

Special Section from Joe Blachy:

August 2025…Introduction to International Projects

Fellow Rotarians: During the next few months, I would like to share with you a few ideas about Rotary International Service.

I have structured them in the following manner:
1.    History of outstanding projects that your Rotary Club has implemented, which made a significant impact on many worldwide communities!
2.    How the money works!
3.    Why the Rotary approach works so very well, better than any other service club in the world!
4.    Potential Internal projects that we as a club may consider

Following, is how Ernie Mainland introduced our club to our biggest project ever:
You know the horrible carnage when an airplane crashes! Now imagine three 747’s Crashing at Metropolitan airport, with all aboard being killed and that happening every day, of the year…year after year!

When you add up those numbers that's how many children are killed from polio every year throughout the world! What's even worse are the hundreds of thousands that are crippled for life!

WOW! Pretty powerful! That's why I've never forgotten that day.

Take a look at the picture on your table from today those little children were lucky to have the braces and crutches that they were given, but most of the children in the third-world countries didn't even get those. They were carried or they dragged their bodies through the dirt until they died.
Some of the fortunate ones were able to be helped by an iron lung, if you can call that fortunate! Imagine sticking your child into one of those!

A couple of Polio facts:
1.    Polio is a virus that is spread by contaminated water mostly to children under 5. 
2.    Dr. Salk’s vaccine was licensed in the USA in 1960
3.    1988 350,000 cases Worldwide
4.    1995 165,000,000 children were vaccinated in China and India in one week. As I recall Chris Etienne was one of about 20 people from our area that participated in India in that vaccination

What did your Rotary Club do. We did what Rotarians do. The first ever calendar event, asking our neighbors to help and contributions by pretty much every Rotarian in club raised, as I recall $84,000, at the 210% inflation since 1984, that is about $176,000 in today's money. 

I recall that a vaccination at that time cost about $0.10 that means that we vaccinated 840,000 children throughout the world, saving many little children from them from certain death or living an entire life being crippled.

Since that time, your club has contributed much more, and will continue to do so until polio is 100% gone
Service above self…locally and internationally!

That is what Rotarians do!