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The Mill Valley Song Turns 50! - Rita Abrams Shares Her Story.
Oct. 20, 2020
Two-time Emmy Award winner Rita Abrams describes how her smallest musical creation became the biggest legacy of her musical career.
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We’ve Voted. Now What? - Election Aftermath
Nov. 03, 2020
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Last Boat out of Shanghai and What that Great Escape Means for Today.
Nov. 17, 2020
Bay Area author Helen Zia discusses her latest book " Last Boat Out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Fled Mao’s Revolution" , a deeply moving chronicle of the extraordinary ordeals and exodus of four ordinary Chinese in a world torn by war and fractured by ideology. Their experiences in fleeing China and their struggles to survive as exiles and refugees in the US, Hong Kong, Taiwan and wherever the diaspora would take them are mirrored by an untold exodus of millions of others then and throughout human migrations from catastrophe, and will likely provide insights to people of Hong Kong and other hot spots today. Marin's Amy Tan, author of "The Joy Luck Club" noted: “Zia’s portraits are compassionate and heartbreaking, and they are, ultimately, the universal story of many families who leave their homeland as refugees and find less-than-welcoming circumstances on the other side. I read with a personal hunger...”
Her book was one NPR's "Best books of the year" and finalist for a national PEN America book award. As.the San Francisco Chronicle review wrote: "a fascinating read as a missing chapter of modern history finally coming to light. What makes the Shanghai story unique is that the real human cost of the massive exodus has remained a mystery. Official records, if any, are suppressed, and research in this area has been sketchy. " Last Boat Out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Fled Mao’s Revolution" . . . fills a gap in our collective memory.
Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/RotaryClubOfMillValley/posts/3384125631704995 |
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Honoring the Fallen
Dec. 01, 2020
One of the most important and least known duties in the Marine Corps and in all the other US military branches is the Casualty Assistance Call Officer. Headquarters Marine Corps utilizes a nationwide network to identify Marine officers and senior enlisted members for this duty. Once assigned, these Marines' primary duties is to notify the next of kin of fallen Marines. Once notification is made, these Marines are responsible for follow-up visits to explain military benefits and to provide military honors if requested by the family. These assignments are some of the most difficult in the Marine Corps. Every Marine in this duty understands this is the very least they can do to honor the service of fallen Marines and help families deal with the loss of their loved one. "Honoring the Fallen" explains this process and why it is so important to those serving and their families. |
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A Voice In The Wilderness--Medgar Evers & The Miss
Dec. 15, 2020
The Post Civil War Era ushered in the period of Reconstruction which lasted from 1865-1877. It was during this time, that swelled bereft masses of former slaves flooded the war torn South as bitter Confederate sentiments lingered. Due to Congress legislating the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, “freedmen” were indelibly engrafted into the nation’s social fabric as full citizens. The American ideology of race had seemingly found a tangible resolution. However, President Rutherford B. Hayes began withdrawing Northern troops from the former Confederacy in 1877 as a result of political wrangling. This ill conceived decision invited pernicious violence towards people of African descent for generations to come. Unimpeded intimidation, disenfranchisement and Jim Crow beset the hopes of so many for another one hundred years. The following century gave rise to the “Greatest Generation” that would produce new social leaders such as Medgar Wiley Evers who would recraft America’s Civil Rights narrative. Being born in 1925, he was a child of the Great Depression and eventually became a soldier during World War II. His tour ended after the successful D-Day Invasion and he returned home in 1946. Like his peers, liberal cultural experiences abroad nurtured within him a newly formed dignity that would not yield to the traditional racial norms of Mississippi. He obtained his undergraduate degree in Business Administration from Alcorn A&M College in 1952 and had accepted the state’s NAACP Field Representative position by 1955. After doing so, Evers relocated his young family from Mound Bayou to Mississippi’s capitol. Here, he became a voice in the wilderness.
Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page: |
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The Spirit of Sarajevo: A Story of Resilience
Jan. 05, 2021
For centuries, Sarajevo was known as a crossroads of cultures -- a peaceful place that valued a variety of religious traditions and ethnic heritages. It was a vibrant capital city that shone on the global stage and even hosted the 1984 Winter Olympics. But the rise of nationalism within former Yugoslavia led to a brutal conflict that threatened to wipe away the city’s legacy of openness and tolerance. For nearly four years, Sarajevo was under armed siege--the longest one of any city in the history of modern warfare. When it was finally lifted, Sarajevo was left a broken city marked by crumpled buildings … the scars of mortar shells … and shattered families beset by grief. Yet still, somehow, the spirit of Sarajevo never wavered. This book is a story of life under siege, created from unimaginable misery and degradation. It is a story about resilience and determination, which now, more than 20 years after the siege ended, serves as an example for all of us as we navigate a confused, frightened world of being “under siege” during this pandemic. Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page: |
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Angel Island, Guardian of the Western Gate
Jan. 19, 2021
John will provide a live program from the US Immigration Station, Angel Island. The walls of the historic detention barracks are filled with poetry, written and carved by immigrants expressing their feelings of frustration, anger, and hope. Historically called the “Guardian of the Western Gate” by immigration staff, the station is second in size only to Ellis Island in New York. The detention facility was built to enforce immigration laws of the era including the Chinese Exclusion Act. People from over 80 countries, were detained on Angel Island between 1910-1940, the largest groups were immigrants from China, Japan, Russia, and India. Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page: |
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Sail Cowabunga: A Family's 10 Years at Sea
Feb. 02, 2021
From Bordeaux France to San Francisco, California, her talk follows a Franco-American couple and their two young sons across the Atlantic Ocean and into a ten-year journey at sea. Through their adventures and misadventures, tragedies, and glories across four continents, the Couvreux family rarely had a dull moment living on the water. Janis chronicles in vivid and lively detail how they fended off a midnight intruder, sailed to the microscopic St. Peter and St. Paul rocks on the equator, explored the jungles of French Guiana and Devil’s Island, and sailed through Cuba in the turmoil of the late 80s. Their adventure was not without hardship, however, as Janis recounts battling medical emergencies that required sending her husband across the globe for treatment (twice), leaving her to single handedly orchestrate a Panama Canal passage amid pre-war chaos. While living in the close quarters of their 42-foot sailboat, the Cowabunga, the Couvreux family was able to maintain sanity and a normal daily routine of cooking, schooling, and sleeping at sea, knowing all the while that something unexpected might be waiting just around the next peninsula.
Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page:
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Marooned in Paradise during the Pandemic
Feb. 16, 2021
Nick Zoa landed on Kosrae in Micronesia on March 6th, not knowing that he would be the last tourist to come to this tiny South Pacific island in 2020. Although Nick planned to continue to nearby islands on March 9th, all his flight reservations were cancelled when Micronesia declared a Covid-19 travel ban on March 8th.
Nick soon realized that being marooned in Kosrae isn't such a bad thing. The island is a tropical paradise with high mountains, dense jungles, a warm ocean and healthy reefs. With his background in geology, Nick has been in demand by Kosrae's environmental management authority. The local college offered him a furnished apartment on the beach in exchange for teaching a few classes. Thanks to the travel ban, Kosrae is one of the few places in the world that remains 100% virus-free. Life is normal here. There are no masks. There's no need for social distancing. Schools, businesses and churches have stayed open. Although Nick has visited 158 countries in the past two decades, he's been confined to an island less than 10 miles long for almost a year. The island life is comfortable and healthy. The Kosraeans are some of the friendliest and most generous people he's met anywhere. When this pandemic is over, Nick will resume his travels, thankful for having had the chance to know a place that the rest of the world has never heard of. Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page:
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California Embraces the Great White Fleet
Mar. 03, 2021
John Freeman's presentation will focus on the lavish welcome the Fleet received in the Bay Area, including how Marin County participated.
Teddy Roosevelt’s Great White Fleet made a bold display of the United State’s new role as an international power 113 years ago. The fleet left Hampton Road, Virginia in December 1907 and traveled around South America, and into the Pacific Ocean. In each of the ports it stopped along our coast, the fleet was hosted and toasted with an exuberant show of patriotism and pride, culminating with the fleet entering the Golden Gate on May 6, 1908, where an estimated crowd of a million people thronged to get a look at the 16 battleships.
San Francisco Bay Area hosted one of the finest receptions our navy has ever seen with spectacular parades, grand balls, banquets, and lots of exciting activities for all the sailors. The visit of the fleet was the first major public celebration of San Francisco's recovery from the earthquake and fire, and the city capitalized on the events to boast to the world about it’s rebuilding progress and it’s ability to accommodate the “grandest fleet in the finest harbor in the world.”
After two months based in San Francisco, the fleet would cross the Pacific Ocean, the Indian Ocean, through the Suez Canal to the Mediterranean Sea into the Atlantic Ocean, arriving back at Hampton Road on Washington’s Birthday, 1909, to complete this triumphant circumnavigation of the world.
Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page:
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There were HOW MANY dairies in Marin County???
Mar. 30, 2021
Beginning in the middle of the 1800's, the dairy industry in Marin grew dramatically until by the end of the century the county had become the major supplier of dairy products to San Francisco and one of the major dairy centers in the country. Those dairies, which over the years numbered more than 350, blanketed the county, and cows were a familiar site grazing on the hillsides. Today, just over twenty of those dairies remain. Mike Moyle, who heads the History Committee at the IDESST Sausalito Portuguese Cultural Center, and West Marin historian Dewey Livingston, are collaborating to identify all of those dairies and the individuals who operated them over the years. Mike will be speaking to us about this project, as well as about some of the dairies that were in and around Mill Valley. Today those dairies are largely forgotten. However, as Mike likes to say: "Watch where you step! If you are somewhere in Marin County, it's likely it was once a cow pasture." Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page: |
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Carving Joy, Finding Peace
Apr. 13, 2021
Scott will briefly discuss his Vietnam experience as a 19-year-old Marine machine gunner during the years 1967-68 and how he used a Chopin tune from a music box and the imagery of a carousel to help calm him between firefights. After coming home, he walked a years-long path of social isolation and escape as do so many combat veterans. Seventeen years later he came across a broken-down 1910 carousel frame, brought it home to Colorado from Utah and over two and a half decades carved all new animals to repopulate the frame and mechanism. He will describe the beginnings of a non-profit organization, The Carousel of Happiness, and efforts to construct a building and operate it. He will briefly describe another related sculptural project called The Council of Kindness, a different kind of healing experience. Whereas the carousel was to help him heal, the “council” was designed to help others.
Scott Harrison will be joined by Shane Matthews, the filmmaker of “Carving Joy”, a short documentary film about the origins of the Carousel of Happiness. Shane will talk about why he created the film, “Carving Joy”, and a bit about the filming. Shane will show it and afterwards, Scott will give an update on the present state of both these projects.
One film reviewer wrote this about the documentary: "Simple. Poignant. Powerful. Scott opened himself up in a way that few soldiers were able to do after the unimaginable horror of the war experience. He recognized grace and accepted it. He then chose joy as the gift of his life, to give to others and to himself."
For reference on both projects: https://www.
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