Jesse Charles: Bringing Their Stones Home -- Restoring Gravestones to the Old Dane County Asylum and Poor Farm. As President of the Verona Area Historical Society, our speaker has been engaged in a long-term project to uncover the history of a graveyard connected to the Verona Poor House on the southeast side of Verona, near the Farm and Fleet. Jesse shared with us his detective work, including talking to old-timers in the area who remembered the gravestones, which had since disappeared. He’s located some 70 of the total 370 stones and is gradually returning them to their original site with a commemorative plaque. Thought-providing program on history, mortality, and the perseverance needed to link the two.
Next Week’s Speaker: Randy Sproule with Jerry Apps’ Limping Through Life video about his life with polio
C'mon to our Annual Club Social on Saturday, Feb 23 at the new Verona Town Hall at 7669 County Highway PD. Conviviality starts at 630pm, with dinner at 7 and a program at 8. It's a Southern-style repast, pulled together by our own irrepressible Mary Ruth Marks.
You'll cruise a buffet line of Shrimp & Grits, Jambalaya, Wisconsin Mac & Cheese, and Beans & Rice, accompanied by southern-style cornbread. Drinks will be red and white wine, along with bottled beer. Dessert? Chess Pie (look it up!) and Banana Pudding. Entertainment will be the announcement of two new Paul Harris Fellows, as well as a What's My Line game show with glib Rotarian panelists, an electrifying MC, and a series of mystery guests. A night to remember, y'all.
We're running a little late this year because of relentless Russian hacking and a debilitating polar vortex, so we need your RSVP RIGHT AWAY.
Please respond to Treasurer John Olsen (johno.olsen@gmail.com) and let him know if you're coming and if you're a one or a two.
The cost is $35 each. Please give John Olsen a check this Friday for your bill, or mail him a check at
Basketball Cards have arrived. Your Board of Directors would like 100%
participation. One packet is $100.00. A suggested buyout is $75.00.
Here is how it works: $10.00, buys a person one "membership card”. If they buy two, they can get a third card free on the www.basketballsweeps.com/FREE site.
Each card contains 4 NCAA Basketball teams below the scratch-off area. If you have a team that does not make the event, there will be a replacement team announced prior to the tournament. These teams are your teams for the duration of the tournament. You total all of the scores of your 4 teams to find your total for the event. The highest score wins $200.00, 2nd place $100, 3rd place $75.00, 4th place $50.00 and the lowest score wins $75.00.
Checks for winners will be distributed following the final game. There are 700 tickets available for sale. Ticket stubs must be retained and turned in with your money to Deb Dieter by March 22, 2019.
Deb Dieter runs this project. Questions, kudos, or gripes, email Deb at debragdieter@gmail.com
Our Club is looking for three more members to join our three current members who volunteer as Assistant Treasurers for our weekly meetings. The Assistant Treasurers take turns every six weeks staffing the registration table. The information recorded includes Attendance of Members, Visiting Rotarians and Guests, and Receipts of all Cash and Checks, including receipts brought from the Club’s Post Office Box each week. After the meeting, the Assistant Treasurer deposits the receipts to the Club and Foundation Bank Accounts at BMO Harris Bank. The reports from the meeting are then emailed to the Club Secretary, Club Treasurer, and Club Bookkeeper.
The Assistant Treasurer is expected to make the bank deposits shortly after the meeting, and not later than the Tuesday following the Friday meeting. The reports and bank receipts need to be scanned so they can be emailed as noted above. The reports provided by the Assistant Treasurers each week serve as the source documents for much of the activity and finances of our Club and our Foundation. Timely and accurate reporting is essential to the successful and efficient operation of the Club.
If you would like to help with this very important function, please contact Treasurer John Olsen at johno.olsen@gmail.com or 608-220-2826. He has a more detailed list of the duties that he can share with you to make sure you feel comfortable with the position. To get started, you would shadow John or one of the experienced Assistant Treasurers for one or two meetings, and you would always have others to contact if you need assistance. Also, if particular week conflicts with your schedule, it’s very easy to trade weeks with one of the other Assistant Treasurers.
The Red Badge program was developed many years ago to ensure that new members were made aware of our club’s leadership, operations, fundraising, projects, and charitable giving. We have modified the Red Badge program over the years and added a mentor program that we find more effective. At our January board meeting, we voted to end the Red Badge program and instead rely on the mentor program to onboard and support new members. As a result, all new members will immediately be given a blue badge. For those still slapping on a red badge on Fridays, you’ll be receiving a blue badge soon. On a side note, I personally set the record for the longest-tenured red badge and I didn’t want to lose that dubious distinction.
Established as a Rotary Structured Program in 1971, Rotary Youth Leadership Awards (RYLA) is Rotary's leadership training program for young people. The Rotary District 6250 RYLA program is a camp designed to build future leaders and Rotarians who exemplify the four-way test.
If you know a high school sophomore who would benefit from leadership training, please refer them to RYLA!! Questions?
You know the feeling. It’s 7 am on the third Tuesday of the month. You’re just hanging around in your robe and slippers, thinking about the tedious day ahead. But wait! You could be going to an MWTM Rotary Board meeting at Capitol Bank on High Point Road at 7 am on the third Tuesday of the month. The meeting typically runs until 8:30 or 9:00. You’ll get a chance to see all the behind-the-scenes effort and commitment that go into helping our Club do all its good work. If you see your Rotary membership as a long-term commitment, you’ll learn a lot in a couple of hours. Give it a try.
Our Club has supported this financially and with volunteers for many years. On Thursday and Friday, March 7-8, the 36th annual event takes place at the Glacier Canyon Conference Center at the Wilderness Resort in the Dells. They need Speech Judges, Speech Timers, & Interview Judges, all from 4:00-840pm on the 7th. A shuttle bus will depart Madison at 230pm (pickup location TBD) to take Madison volunteers to the Dells and back. Mick Faulhaber leads our Club’s efforts. It’s a great event and a lot of fun. And it helps young people. Contact Mick directly (mfaulhaber@ward-brodt.com). The State Director is Janet Bailey at 920-617-5617, jbailey@cesa7.org.
Nancy Comello has been the heart and soul of a project to provide midwife and birthing education to local Guatemalans. The goal is to reduce mortality and improve the lives of both mothers and children. She has been on a solo crusade with a lofty goal of raising over $80,000 through various sources. It is time to form a committee to support Nancy’s vision and make this effort a high-profile project for the Rotary Club of Madison West Towne-Middleton. We can use help in grant writing, finance, project management, and promotion. Please contact me if interested.
Hmmm … what do we have in common? We both have Middleton in our name. This event has been going for 50 years plus and the proceeds go to Middleton area service clubs and other NPOs. In effort to better promote Rotary in Middleton, Jack and I attended the Middleton GNF board of trustees meeting on Monday. We have participated in this event in the past and believe it’s time to jump back in. I am looking for volunteers to join Jack and me on a Rotary club committee for this interesting fundraising and promotional activity. Please contact one of us soon. The Fest will be Aug 23-25, 2019.
Folks please pay a visit to ClubRunner and check that your anniversary and partner are listed in your entry. If you don’t know how to access ClubRunner, drop me an email.
Our April 26th meeting will be a luncheon at Jefferson Middle School. Many of our members have supported Club activities on behalf of JMS. Now we get to enjoy lunch there and see the facility.
Michael Maass and Ryan Seib have resigned from the Club: Michael because of a work transfer and Ryan because of business workload and a new baby. We wish them well.
takes place at the Glacier Canyon Conference Center at the Wilderness Resort in the Dells. They need Speech Judges, Speech Timers, & Interview Judges, all from 4:00-840pm on the 7th. A shuttle bus will depart Madison at 230pm (pickup location TBD) to take Madison volunteers to the Dells and back. Mick Faulhaber leads our Club’s efforts. It’s a great event and a lot of 