SERVICE ABOVE SELF
ROTARY INTERNATIONAL
I was certainly honoured when the late Jack Turner called into my studio in 1979 to invite me to be a charter member of the next club to be formed The Rotary Club of West Torrens.
We were chartered with 35 members all bar two had never been in Rotary before. We soon became involved in all the good things service clubs do for Community, Vocational and International service.
I was elected president for the 1981/82 year, and it was during my term as president that one of the nicest things happened.
The club met on a Tuesday and on this particular night, I had already informed the club that I would be a little late as I had a wedding to photograph. In the circumstances instead of being there at around 6pm for a 6.30pm start I arrived at approx 20 minutes past six. The first person I saw entering the room was another photographer, then another and yet another, in fact no less than 12, all bar one being a member of a Rotary club. It had been arranged by the late Brian Cronin, and certainly surprised me.
Pictured above, back row from left, Brian Cronin, Ian Sim, Ron Woolmore, Peter Armitage, Exchange student Lise Kruuse, Graham Shevlin, Pat Quigley, Bob Thorjussen, John Atkins and Werner Bley. Seated at table left, George Hutton, Donald Gee, John Sweeney and Pres.Vic Grimmett.
Following my year as president I served on several district committees, and was club sergeant, public relations chairman, and bulletin editor on two occasions, each time winning the district award for best club bulletin.
When I moved from my studio on Marion Road, I transferred to The Rotary Club of Flinders Park, and have found fellowship there of great value. Asked in 1997/98 to once again be bulletin editor I accepted and felt a great deal of satisfaction for the club when the bulletin was judged the best in the district, the first district award received by the club in its 14 year history.
One of the great programs in which Rotary is involved is Youth Exchange, where a student from one country travels to another for one year, all expenses paid. Providing a club is prepared to accept a student from another country, it can then nominate a student from its own district to travel abroad.
Over the years my family hosted students from America, Japan, Norway, Finland, South Africa, Holland. One of the first to arrive was Keiko Miyakura, from Japan, in 1983,pictured right with Vic-san when she revisited Australia three years ago, and after all those years we still communicate, these days by E-mail.
