Meeting Notes July 8, 2015
Our Greeter this morning was Rev. Jeff Kistler and he did an excellent job.
President Herb rang the bell at 7:30 a.m. Chuck Ehninger gave a very nice invocation with special mention of Don Grammes.
GUESTS: Steve LaPierre, Emmaus RC; Matthew Caccese, guest of David Caccese.
We collected donations for the Lowhill Township Food Pantry that totaled $214. Thank you all.
RECOGNITION:
Bill & Sue Weber were honored for having 8 years of perfect attendance.
RI Foundation Chair David Caccese awarded PDG Bill Weber his next level Paul Harris Fellow pin for PHF +6.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Last Saturday there were 3 AW Rotarian volunteers at the Food Pantry. There are 3 times a month when we can really help. Contact Barb to sign up.
Our next Thursday evening meeting at the Holiday Inn will be tomorrow July 9th at 5:30 PM. Herb will review this year’s plans.
AJ said our club's third annual Community Pig Roast Fundraiser is on Saturday July 18, 2015 at Ontelaunee Park in New Tripoli from 4:00 PM - 7:00 PM.
NOTE: There still is a need for volunteers to work a shift to make things happen.
Please invite friends and family and join your fellow members for food and fun and fellowship.
The 4th annual Yvette Palmer Purple Pinkie 5K run / walk will be on October 24th at LCCC’s campus. This is a district-wide fundraiser for Polio Plus and will involve Interact students from all over our five county district.
The PP Committee will meet on Thursday evening July 9th at the Holiday Inn immediately after the regular meeting. Please join this committee. The goal is to make this a great event.
The NWL SD “Night in the Country” will be on August 15th. Barb needs us to sign up for two-hour shifts to staff our display table.
Our AWRC annual Summer Picnic will be on SUNDAY August 23rd at the Webers farm. This year it also will be a new member recruiting event. Bring a covered dish to share. Fishing is available.
Note that we all can suggest or request speakers and topics for future meetings. Please send your ideas to Jeanne Shipe and Geoff Legg.
President Herb asks us all to e-mail him about any announcements to be made at future meetings so he can include them as part of his planned agenda.
Next week our scheduled Greeter is Geoff Legg, and our program will be President Herb describing just how good this Rotary year will be for AWRC.
LUCK of the DRAW:
The door prize donated by Jeff was won by Jean Masiko. The $75 pot of the 50:50 was not won by Chad Butters who selected a white marble out of nine choices.
FINES:
S-a-A Don Davis fined Gwen Pongracz for her lateness. Don missed seeing this, so Bill Weber fined himself for not wearing any socks today.
HAPPY DOLLARS:
David Caccese was happy that son, Matt, was here today, And he was happy to have celebrated his birthday last week. Later on we sang Happy Birthday to him.
Sue is most happy to announce that we now have FOUR host families lined up for our exchange student from Slovakia.
Bill Palmer was happy that the U.S. women’s Soccer team won the Gold.
The AW “Rotarian of the Week” is Chad Butters, recently retired from 25 years in the U.S. Army flying Blackhawk helicopters at one time. Herb noted that Chad attended our January Rotary Info Night and then got involved with the Tempting Tastes event, thus becoming hooked on Rotary and AW Rotarians.
PROGRAM:
Our program today was a presentation by AW Rotarian of the week, Chad Butters as his classification talk. Chad used PowerPoint and started with an agenda.
Chad was born in Charleston, S.C. where his father helped to build electric power generation plants. And they moved regularly following that work, so Chad spent time in TX, CA, ME and NE.
Chad’s family is wife of 24 years, Jody, Nick who is 26 and still searching for himself, and daughter Carly who is 22 and just started a job at a Distillery. The family likes to travel, and over 7 years ago Chad ‘s work lead him to settle his family in New Tripoli.
Chad joined the military in 1990 and earned a BS degree in Aeronautics. Then in 2013 he earned an MBA from Drexel University. He still has 22 days+ of active duty before his official retirement from the Army. On June 13th they had a great retirement party.
In 1990 Chad was a mechanic for Apache helicopters. Then he became a Blackhawk pilot after which he began teaching others, including recovery operations.
Just a few years ago Chad and family decided that their future was to own their own business and one that can be easily passed on to the next generation. They decided on craft distilling to produce Vodka, Gin, Rum and Applejack. The New Tripoli area offers nearby farms for grain, it has great fresh water -- and it’s close to home.
Chad told the story of the Baldwin apple used for the best Applejack. His 8th grandfather planted those apple trees that Baldwin made famous. His equipment comes from a firm in Stuttgart, Germany. They broke ground on June 13th and expect to be operating in October. They will distribute through the State Stores.
Chad for the first time showed his 8 Oaks bottle. The name comes from a family tradition of using the number 8 in correspondence for generations to indicate “I love you.” The oaks comes from the barrels in which the alcohols are aged.
Chad concluded noting that he likes scuba diving, sailing and golf. But he has no time for them these days. His enthusiasm and initiative certainly will benefit Rotary and those we serve.
CLOSING:
We sang an interesting rendition of “God Bless America.” This was followed by the recitation of the Pledge to the Flag of the United States and then the saying “One profits most who serves the best.”
ocus on membership for our Club. 
