Past-President Adam Manning welcomed everyone to the Centerville Rotary Club and led the Pledge of Allegiance. PDG Harvey Smith provided the prayer.
Today’s Quote: "Great opportunities to help others seldom come, but small ones surround us every day." Sally Koch (Sister who serves as Communication Director for Los Angeles Province)
Thanks to today’s greeters Jim Stuart & Gina Smith
Welcome to today’s guests: Gina’s parents Linda and Ed (who has submitted an application to join); and Brad Huffman’s daughter, Bella.
Announcements:
- Pancake Committee met yesterday. Sponsorship forms will be out soon. Next meeting is August 8, 11 am at Yankee Trace.
- Business membership committee is working on a draft proposal. Stay tuned.
- Board meeting Monday night included approvals for:
- $2,800 for signage at Bill Yeck Park for seed nursery & bird blind; signs will go up this fall, will include Rotary logo and name
- $1,000 for Agape for Youth to fund one month of foster family onboarding & training.
- Kelly McDonald reminded all to sign up for the upcoming social at Sueño on August 29..
- Reminder that you can pay Happy Bucks via Venmo (code on each table)
- Rotary theme pins are available for this year’s theme: The Magic of Rotary.
- Brian Hayes reminded all to pay your bill
- Brad Huffman announced our next exchange student will arrive August 10 around 10:45 pm. Her name is Pichpattra and she is from Thailand.
Happy Bucks this quarter are going to Operation Warm, providing winter coats to children in need.
Pat Beckel was our Sergeant at Arms with help from Brian Hayes.
Pat started with the Member Minute - Kristin Hutton shared she is the co-founder of Lytle Grove, and just celebrated their 4th anniversary. They provide promotional products and apparel - Use promotional items with a purpose. They get their work mostly by word of mouth. Usually 2 week turnaround but can sometimes make it work faster.
Happy Bucks were generously given for:
- Pat was happy Boyd was back.
- Ed happy to be here.
- Raj was just happy.
- Gina was happy for her visitors and shared her daughter just proved she has a tender heart - she had to give her cat gave away, and when that didn’t work, she’s looking for another home.
- Mark completed a patio project.
- Jackie was happy.
- Kristin was happy for her 3rd wedding anniversary, her birthday, and Lytle Grove’s anniversary all this week.
- Kelly was happy.
- Crissy was happy.
- Socks was happy God is with him.
- Jeff had 4 tickets to the Dragon’s game tonight to give away.
- Rand joked his picture is at the post office in Marion County FL.
- Dave shared his oldest grandson is getting married this weekend which makes him feel old.
- Jim H was happy.
- Chuck was happy.
- Bill was happy.
- Crissy was happy.
- Boyd was happy to be back and thanked all for their kind words.
- Carol shared former exchange student Saloni Bagwani has a book available on Amazon sharing how the Rotary exchange program changed her life. Saloni’s Odyssey: Exchange of Dream to Reality.
- Elda was happy.
- Brad H for his guest/daughter, and echoed that his Rotary Exchange in 1994-95 was life-changing for him. He recently visited his host family, and felt it was great to connect his kids to them and their kids. Rotary Exchange Program spans generations.
- Arnie shared that Saloni also spoke at the RI Congress! Arnie had the opportunity to speak at the Kirkwood, MO Rotary Club.
- Lee will be at the Butler County Fair on Saturday, purchasing animals from kids.
- Lisa gave a coat, and is going to Cabo, Mexico.
- Jim S loves the idea of learning about Rotarians, and his youngest is named Bella.
Our speaker today was Tom Nicholas, Director of Media Relations and announcer for the Dayton Dragons.
Tom Nichols has been with the Dayton Dragons since 2008, and a broadcaster since 1988. He is a 1986 Ball State University graduate and is in the Indiana Broadcaster Hall of Fame.
Tom shared he does the play by play on WONE radio for every Dayton Dragon’s game. They are permitted to have 15 televised games per season. He is the only Dayton Dragons employee who travels with the team (team is employed by the Reds.) All media relations is his responsibility.
Tom shared he knew what he wanted to do since 4th grade. He listened to the Cincinnati Reds and wanted to do what announcers Marty and Joe did.
While in school, he called the Indianapolis Indians team and asked how to get started as a professional broadcaster. There was an opening for second broadcaster so he sent them a cassette tape of his work. They invited him to do the opening night game and he then got 25 more games that summer.
He was fortunate to work with great players when he first started:
Randy Johnson - his 1st year
Larry Walker - his 2nd year
Pete Rose, Jr - his 3rd year
He said he had a future Hall of Famer on every team.
The Dayton Dragons are known for their big attendance record - they broke the all time record in 2011 for the most consecutive sellout dates. They have been 1st in Single-A in all 23 years of existence for attendance.
They have several famous alumni:
Tom told the story of meeting a new player who told him his goal was to have 96 stolen bases that year, when the club record was 36. By the end of the season, he had 103. The player was Billy Hamilton who was the fastest in the league and stole 155 bases one year.
145 Dragons players have gone on to the major league.
The Dragons games are known for their Disney-type entertainment - atmosphere geared toward family entertainment. They have 5 mascots - Heater & Gem are the most popular. They have contests, skits, singalongs all during the game. They take advantage of the 90 second break every time a team changes to do entertainment.
The fan favorite is the Toddler Race, where a baby has their first career standing ovation by Dragons fans
The Dragons are the Reds farm system. Reds have 30 scouts, with territories to watch games and look for talent. At draft time, they pick 20 players. Players go through: Rookie - Single A - High Single A (Dragons) - Double A - Triple A - Reds. About 10% will make it all the way to the Reds.
The Dragons go through 5 doz balls/night. Any time it hits the dirt they replace it
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