Club President Brad Thorp opened the Centerville Rotary Club meeting at The Clubhouse at Yankee Trace by leading the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag. Sivaji Subramaniam led the prayer, and Brad led the singing of America the Beautiful.

 

 

 

PDG Harvey Smith recognized three club members by presenting them with Paul Harris Fellow awards: Boyd Preston for his second donation of $1,000; Dick Hoback for his third donation of $1,000; and Ron Hollenbeck for his seventh donation of $1,000 to the Rotary Foundation.

 The club sang Happy Birthday to those members with birthdays in July, and the birthday crowd sat at a table especially designated and decorated for them. 

 

 Member Jeff Senney said the House of Bread will be holding its 4th Annual Gala, at 6 p.m. Saturday Aug. 1 at the Ponitz Center, Building 12 , at Sinclair Community College. Tickets are $60 per person, $500 per table. Jeff said he already has reserved two tables. The keynote speaker will be Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley.

 

 President Brad said the club has received a district grant of $1,000 to help with our Warm Coats project.

 

 A number of members gave $20 or a dollar or more for the project during the collection of Happy Bucks.

 

  It was noted that the Rotary Cocktail Club will meet at the Warped Wing Brewery Co. at Fourth and (26) Wyandot streets in the Oregon District from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Thursday July 30.

 

 

 

 

 

 Fred, who has been a member of the Centerville Rotary for 23 years, said he was born in his parent's farm house on Kemp Road in Dayton. His mother was a nurse. He was the first of three children. He has a younger brother and then six years later his younger sister was born. He went to Kemp School in East Dayton, being held back a year before he could go and then attended school in Beavercreek from third grade through eighth grade before going to Wilbur Wright High School, where he graduated in 1949. 

 He attended Miami University for one and a half years before enlisting in the U.S. Air Force, as the Korean War was underway. He served three years and then entered his grandfather's lumber business. It had started as the Kuntz-Johnson Lumber Yard and his grandfather had bought out Peter Kuntz's interest. His grandfather and his brother also had a wallboard company and Fred moved to Buffalo, New York to run the company but that didn't work out for him so he moved back to the area and started a building business in Tipp City, where he met his wife Celia on a blind date. They met at Easter time, he said, and were married by September. They have six children, three boys and three girls, and 10 grandchildren.'

 He started his own building business  in 1975 and worked it until 2008, he said.

 He said in his earlier years he worked with the Centerville Co-eds keeping all their props in shape over the years. He would go to all the practices...there were 60 girls who could really kick high..he said, and if a prop was missing something he would repair or replace it.

 

Brad noted that Fred has been a part of practically every project the club has helped build, from gazebos in the parks to the recent staircase project at The Castle, and the building of a large chicken coop in Honduras a number of years ago. 

 

 Fred said he has lived in 40 different locations in six different states  over the years, improving houses.