Our
club’s busiest chauffeur is our “craft talker” this Friday.
He’s been self-employed for 27 years, a member of our club for 22.
That’s
Lionel G. Ruhman. His
passenger-carrying peregrinations are many and long, but for free. He uses his roomy van. In
it he recently drove our Rotary volleyball players to a Sacramento tourney,
which they won, and then he transported them home in triumph.
As a reward he was made a non-playing member of the team.
More often he moves vanloads of Masons hither and yon whenever (as quite
often) he is at a Masonic convention or excursion.
Masonry
is big with Lionel and vice-versa. It’s
a secret order but he absorbed some lore from boyhood, because uncles and a
grandfather were Masons. He was
initiated in 1958, served as master (top official) of one lodge in 1995, and
currently rules another.
When
the massive Masonic temple on Santa Monica Boulevard began to show its age in
1995, Lionel took charge of rebuilding and renovating.
The work took two years but he charged nothing.
Building
is his business, usually limited to buildings that he subsequently owns and
manages. Currenly he owns five
local residential buildings and one commercial property.
His son manages these for him. He
also has a daughter who is a medical writer for a reporting service.
Certain
minor mysteries in Lionel’s life will presumably unravel as he tells us about
himself. Why did he move from his
Illinois birthplace to Santa Monica? How
did a wandering young Air Force cadet woo and marry a local 17-year old girl?
Lacking clients or customers, how did he get started as a builder?
Lionel will be the sole craft talker this Friday. For the other half of the program, we’ll hear President John describe his trip to the Rotary International assemblage. And he’ll show pictures he took en route. Thus, after the usual many-splendored lunch, we’ll be edified by two of our own members.
Coming
Club Meetings
August
11
Panel discussion; Living Wage Proposals
August
18
Tom Donner: Santa
Monica Education Initiative
August
25
Mike O’Hara: Inside the
Olympic Games
September 1 Dark – Labor Day
Two Fined,
Two Spared
President John demonstrated on July 21 that he is learning to extract
funds from distinguished fellow Rotarians.
His first attempt failed. He tried to fine John Miller for getting married, only to learn that the wedding is
planned for later. Members are
waiting to see if John remembers at the correct time.
Then John told new member Dr. Louis Koster that
his far-ranging humanitarian activities would cost him $600 for Rotary’s own
beneficent operations. This was the
heaviest fine in recent memory. We
all salute Louis gratefully.
John deemed Con Oyler’s law
story worth $50. It was agreed that
laughing at oneself is good, even if expensive.
Moreover we admired the dazzling beauty of
Con’s “Miss Virginia” guest. We
trust that he will continue to keep an appreciative eye peeled, for our benefit.
Finally John conveyed our appreciation to Dr. Dick Rice for his
diligent work in rewording our club by-laws. John
decreed this so beneficial to the club that no fine would be fitting.
n Lionel Ruhman
What’s
That Card?
Something new has been inserted in this month’s ROTARIAN magazine.
You’ll find it in every issue from now on.
It’s a handy card you can use to propose qualified new members for our
Rotary Club. RI President Frank J.
Devlyn is challenging each club to increase its net membership by five Rotarians
this year. The card is a reminder
and resource, suggested by RI’s Membership Development Task Force.
You probably have at least one friend who would make a good Rotarian. The card is a way to start the process of inviting him or her. Just fill in the card and give to Barbara Hopper or Secretary Karen Baker.
THE MAN WHO WATCHES OUR DOLLARS
(One of a series on the club’s officers)
Few Rotarians have belonged to four Rotary Clubs.
Our treasurer, Hugh M. Travis, has.
He joined in 1981 in Franklin, Tennessee, and subsequently was a member
in Orlando, Florida and Johnson City, Tennessee, before joining us in 1993.
He’s jumped around as an executive for the Boy Scout movement, taking
charge of scouting in ever-larger communities.
Wherever he went, the Rotary clubs quickly recruited him, as they do with
Scout executives almost everywhere.
Scouting became part of Hugh’s life as a boy in Nashville, where he
soared to Eagle. He majored in
Biology at Tennessee Technological University, envisioning an outdoor career
helping Mother Nature. But after he
graduated in 1976, offers came only for desk jobs in giant government agencies
such as the Food and Drug Administration. He
didn’t fancy himself as a bureaucrat. So
he consulted a friend who was in Scouting professionally, learned that
entry-level work as a “field executive” was open in the town of Pulaski, and
took it. He has never left the
movement, though he seldom can spend much time now in Scouting’s outdoor
operations.
His office is in Van Nuys, where he usually answers his own phone while
supervising 36 full-time employees. They
keep in touch with Scouting’s thousands of volunteers all over western Los
Angeles County, covering Santa Monica and nearby communities as far east as
Beverly Hills.
As our club treasurer, he may spend an hour or two a week signing checks
and comparing expenditures in 43 budgeted categories to make sure they stay in
line with allotments. His biggest
job is making his report to our board of directors at monthly meetings.
A half-dozen of our directors are business executives who may ask probing
questions about financial plans and undertakings.
The club budget calls for spending about $61,500 during the year, out of
an income of about $82,200. (The plan includes $60 a head to insure each of us against
accidents during Rotary activities.) This
year we figure to spend 5 percent
more than last year, which doesn’t bother Hugh since income is projected to
grow 6.5 percent.
Some of our directors are used to watching bigger budgets than the club’s. But the $4,500,000 operation of Hugh’s Scout council (with more than a thousand budget items) is one of the biggest. It keeps six camps running and pays 250 camp staffers each summer. So Hugh remains placid as he oversees our Rotary flow of funds.