West Covina Sunrise Rotary Club Newsletter , Wednesday November 9, 2005

INVITE A VETERAN TO ROTARY!
Wednesday, November 9th, was a special meeting. We had 6 visiting veterans at the meeting, and we all learned some rather fascinating things about serving in the American Military.

Presidents Message: Aloha my fellow Rotarians. The time has come to start planning our Christmas Basket program. Please bring your calendars to our next meeting. Mahalo

Community Cards: West Covina High School Basketball is selling Community Discount Cards. The cost per card is $10 and you get various discounts at many local retailers for one whole year. Please see Gary Larson (818-489-0041) for more details & purchase of the cards.

West Covina High School Basketball Advertising Banners: You can purchase a banner to hang in the gym at West Covina High School for only $300.00. The banner will hang for the whole year during all events at the gym. See Gary Larson for details.

Program: We had 6 visiting veterans at the breakfast and 5 of them gave us a brief summary of their time in the service. Matt Walters presented us with a brief history of Veteran’s Day. It used to be called Armistice Day and was started back in 1918. George Dargan told us about the service of Lillian Kiel of Covina. She was a highly decorated WWII and Korea War veteran, and the Covina Post Office is going to be renamed in her honor. The West Covina Post Office is also going to honor her service to this Country with a Plague in their Post Office.

Especially the stories about World War II were riveting. I don’t think any of us can ever realize how bad the conditions of war really are! Did you know that during World War II some of the American soldiers were given left over can food from the first World War? One particular can of beet vegetable stew was so rancid one starving sickly dog roaming the country side wouldn’t even eat it? And the boots. They were not water sealed. The boots would get wet and muddy. The mud would dry on the outside, but the inside would remain wet. Your feet were hurting all the time and rather smelly!!! To this day, army veterans still are drawn to the boot section in stores and admire the boots made now a days. If only they had had that kind of boots back then. If you are interested, the book “Citizen Soldier” is recommended by the veterans.

From the Vietnam area, one of the most memorable experiences shared by the Veterans was the Freedom Bird. This is the plane that would take the soldiers home!!!

Our visiting veterans were:
Frank Merdot, Army, Korea
Henry Morgan, Army, WWII
Frank Harden, Marines, Vietnam
Matt Walters, Army, WWII
Willie Vocal, Coastguard (fireman) WWII
Bob Morrin, Army, WWII ( Don Morrin’s dad)
George Dargan, Army, Vietnam

Thank you to all.


Member News: Mike Touhey, who came to the meeting rather sleepy eyed and with good reason. Touhey has been re-elected to the West Covina City Council. Congratulations.

Calendar:

Nov 9: Invite a Veteran to Rotary – weekly meeting

Nov 17: Weekly meeting – program tbd

Nov 24: NO MEETING – Happy Thanksgiving

Dec 5: Weekly meeting – program tbd

Dec 12: Weekly meeting – program tbd

Dec ?: Christmas baskets???