Wednesday, June 3 Socialize @ Noon! 12:30 PM to 1:30 PM WAC
MOHAI Director Leonard Garfield
Curiosity, Community, and the Story of Seattle
"People of all ages come in here and they listen and they reflect on who we are, where we are and they ask themselves what's this all about, which is what we want. We want people to be curious."
— Leonard Garfield
Seattle is changing at a breathtaking pace. New towers rise, neighborhoods evolve, and the city continues to reinvent itself. But amid all that change, one question remains: How do we preserve the stories that define who we are?
Few people are better equipped to answer that question than Leonard Garfield, Executive Director of the Museum of History & Industry (MOHAI) and one of the region's most respected historians.
For more than 25 years, Garfield has helped Seattle understand its past while navigating its future. Under his leadership, MOHAI transformed from a beloved local museum into one of the city's premier cultural institutions, preserving millions of artifacts and stories that capture the spirit of the Pacific Northwest.
Garfield has a front-row seat to Seattle's evolution. He has chronicled the city's triumphs, challenges, innovations, and growing pains while helping residents connect today's headlines with the people and events that shaped our community.
Whether you're a lifelong Seattleite or a relative newcomer, you'll leave with a deeper appreciation for the forces that built our city—and the stories that continue to shape its future.
Join us Wednesday for a fascinating conversation with one of Seattle's foremost civic historians and storytellers.
Important Notice Regarding Dues Payment Conversion
We are continuing to assist members with the transition to QuickBooks billing, which started March 1. Thank you to those who have made this transition and have set up their auto pay.
All members with outstanding invoices have received phone calls and multiple emails regarding their balances since we moved to QuickBooks in March.
If you are still receiving email notifications from QuickBooks or emails from Mary regarding outstanding invoices, please note this means you have outstanding invoices that need to be paid.
Even if you have set up autopay, you may have previous invoices that weren't captured before you set it up.
Please ensure you are current on your billing and reach out to Club Director Mary Goldie if you have questions related to your payment status.
Thank you for helping us with this transition!
Some club members attended a memorial for member Heather Fitzpatrick's husband Brad Sturgill, who passed recently after a long battle with metastatic melanoma. Brad was a passionate baseball fan, so many attended in their favorite team gear!
Thank you for providing the picture, Fedva.
This week capped off another successful ethnic dinner hosted by Fedva Dikmen. 33 members attended.
Thank you Fedva for continuing this tradition!
Interested in hosting or organizing social or service events for fellow club members? Please email Club Director Mary for info on current club needs.
Rotarians Inspired to Succeed and Engage (RISE) is now half full for Cohort 6 that will kick off on September 10th. This is a great professional development program for emerging leaders, President Elects and leaders who would like to enhance their skills. The program cost per participant is $150 and will be charged to the club.
We invite RISE alums to join us at the Happy Hour Networking event at the Roanoke Tavern this Saturday, May 30th after the District Learning Symposium. Details below.
Around 70 attendees came to Hotel Sorrento last Thursday night for the Seattle Rotary Service Foundation's annual Pinkham & Skeel Major Donors Reception. In addition to socializing, attendees heard impactful presentations from two recent grantees-Operation Nightwatch and Open Hearts Big Minds Fund.
Thank you for all those that attended and assisted on the night including Lillian Sherman, David Bobanick, Charmaine Vazquez, and Derrek Zietz!
The Rotary Club of Seattle closed out its year-long focus on healthy communities with a powerful reminder that environmental sustainability is central to that mission. At the May 27 meeting, longtime Rotarian and environmental leader Dave Spicer laid out a stark portrait of a warming planet—then pointed to tangible solutions emerging across the world and within Rotary itself.
“What my goal is, is to try to pull all the dots together to give us a perspective on how serious climate change is,” Spicer told members. “It's very serious in our own region, as well as around the world.”
Spicer, chair of the Environmental Sustainability Committee for Rotary District 5030, drew on data from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the Paris Climate Accords to show that the last decade has been the hottest since global records began in the 19th century. The world is now hovering around 1.5°C of warming, the level scientists have long warned is a critical threshold.
He described how CO₂ and methane—from fossil fuels, feedlots, and thawing permafrost—are driving more intense hurricanes, tornadoes, megafires, and heat domes. Events once considered “once in a century” are occurring with increasing frequency.
Closer to home, Spicer highlighted four climate pressures already reshaping Washington State:
· Ocean acidification harming marine life and oyster beds
· Increasing wildfire risk from diminished, earlier-melting snowpack
· Multi-year drought and emerging water scarcity
· Severe flooding, including a December event that displaced 100,000 people
“These four things are already happening and will get worse in the future,” he said. “That's a reality. We just need to prepare for it, maybe to adapt for it.”
Change of Speakers for June 3, June 17; Break Between Rotary Years
Due to various issues outside of our control, George Simeon of Curevo Vaccine is unable to join us for our June 3 meeting and Howard Behar is no longer able to join us for the June 17 meeting.
Please note our new speakers will be MOHAI Executive Director Leonard Garfield for June 3 and social and community activist LueRachelle Brim-Atkins on June 17. We apologize for these last-minute schedule changes.
After our June 17 meeting, we will have our annual break between Rotary years, returning July 8 at the WAC for our first meeting of the 2026-2027 year with President John Steckler and Mayor Katie Wilson. The registration links for next year will start popping up next week!
Get Involved!
Thursday, June 11th 5:00 PM-8:00 PM Queen City Yacht Club
President's Party
We return to the Queen City Yacht Club for this year's President's Paty. Enjoy us for an evening of celebrating “the year that was”…at Rotary!
In an effort to better inform membership of the health of the club, we will start posting member additions and resignations after each month's club board meeting.
New Members: Kate Tate and Mieka Briejer
Resignations: Alan Bergen, Hisao Inagaki, Candy Lee, Dalia Sherif, May Lin, George Fennell, Jean-Paul Yafali, Frances Walker
We love to see our Rotary members promoting good works in our community and abroad! If you have a project or fundraiser that you are excited about and would like to promote to your fellow club members, please check in with our Club Director, Mary Goldie, before distributing information or invitations through our email roster. We value the privacy of our members’ contact information and can let you know the appropriate ways to reach out to folks in our club. Thank you!!
Meets 10:30 am on the second Tuesday of each month via Zoom; please contact Jevon Powell for calendar invite and link.
The mission of the Local Service Committee is two-fold: to coordinate hands-on service activities for club members, and to accept and process grant applications for local service projects and forward those applications to Seattle Rotary Service Foundation for final evaluation and award.
Serves to fulfill Rotary's mission of "advancing international understanding, goodwill, and peace." The committee selects projects that positively impact the health, education, and welfare of less advantaged people in other countries, with a particular emphasis on youth. Actively works with clubs in our District and abroad to leverage — via matching grants — the amount of money available for a project. Members get involved through direct knowledge of the project or by volunteering. Prior focuses have included malaria projects in Zambia, Tanzania, and Uganda; microcredit and water projects in India; de-mining projects in Vietnam and Lebanon; AIDS orphan support in South Africa and Ethiopia; education/literacy projects in Nepal, Chile, and Hungary; and more than a decade of wide-ranging projects in Russia.
For more information on this committee, please email info@seattlerotary.org.
Meets 10:30 am on the second Tuesday of each month via Zoom; please contact Jevon Powell for calendar invite and link.
The mission of the Local Service Committee is two-fold: to coordinate hands-on service activities for club members, and to accept and process grant applications for local service projects and forward those applications to Seattle Rotary Service Foundation for final evaluation and award.
Serves to fulfill Rotary's mission of "advancing international understanding, goodwill, and peace." The committee selects projects that positively impact the health, education, and welfare of less advantaged people in other countries, with a particular emphasis on youth. Actively works with clubs in our District and abroad to leverage — via matching grants — the amount of money available for a project. Members get involved through direct knowledge of the project or by volunteering. Prior focuses have included malaria projects in Zambia, Tanzania, and Uganda; microcredit and water projects in India; de-mining projects in Vietnam and Lebanon; AIDS orphan support in South Africa and Ethiopia; education/literacy projects in Nepal, Chile, and Hungary; and more than a decade of wide-ranging projects in Russia.
For more information on this committee, please email info@seattlerotary.org.
These are club membership (not total years of Rotary membership) only
1 Year
Ming-Ming Tung-Edelman Bob Braun
2 Years
Arik Korman
3 Years
Julie Kang Eun-ji Seo
5 Years
Dr. Yvonne Richards Brenda Barnes
Tim Cummins Steven Gonzalez
6 Years
Kerry O'Keefe
7 Years
Dorothy Miller Liam Li
8 Years
Jevon Powell
14 Years Peter Wright
15 Years
Sarah Weaver
18 Years
Sue Beller
24 Years
Jerilyn Brusseau John Kilpatrick
25 Years
Charley Dickey
27 Years
Maureen Brotherton
34 Years
Doug Seto
40 Years
Tim Bendokas
43 Years
Tom Herche
Get Involved
Meet fellow Rotarians and get involved in service. See below for a list of committees. Email the committee chair by clicking on their name. Or, contact Mary Goldie for more information.
4. Invite your connections to a weekly meeting, and let mary@seattlerotary.org know so they may be introduced.
If you don't already have a LinkedIn profile, CLICK HERE to learn how to get started.
SEATTLE 4 ROTARY AUDIO VISUAL SPONSORS
Video of Seattle 4 Rotary Programs are available online thanks to the generous support of our Seattle Rotary Audio Visual Sponsors.
In addition to supporting our club, becoming a Seattle 4 Rotary Audio Visual Sponsor brings many benefits. To learn more, click here, or contact Mary for more details at mary@seattlerotary.org.
Do You Have Any Musical Instruments to Donate to Students in Need?
Music4Life is a non-profit and project of Rotary District 5030 that distributes musical instruments to public school students in need.
We welcome any gently used musical instruments you wish to donate. They can be delivered directly to these local music stores that are now open: American Music in Phinney Ridge and Kennelly Keys Music in Bellevue, Lynnwood, and Everett.
Please accompany your instrument with the PDF donation form, linked below.
Our Rotary Cares team is ready to listen and to support you. One of the wonderful things about our club is that you have many friends --you just need to reach out to tap into our amazing network of caring people. Please contact our Rotary Cares Committee Chair to let us know how we can help.
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