There were 38 Eye of the Tiger e‑Kiwanis Club mem­bers and guests present on their com­put­ers or phones for our meet­ing held on the evening of August 20th. Pres­i­dent Barb Thomp­son recalled sev­er­al inter­clubs attend­ed by our mem­bers, includ­ing the Flori­da DCON, Cal­Ne­va DCON and the Cor­tana Kiwa­nis Club of Baton Rouge. 

Pres­i­dent Barb wel­comed par­tic­i­pants from coast to coast in the USA, Cana­da and around the world. We were pleased to have Paul Heinz, Gov­er­nor Elect of the Texas-Okla­homa Dis­trict on our call today along with mem­bers of the Philip­pine Luzon Dis­trict includ­ing Amphy Linn from the Kiwa­nis Club of Manil­la and cur­rent Com­mit­tee Chair for Action Club. Thank you to all who were able to attend our meeting.

Pres­i­dent Barb Thomp­son was excit­ed to be able to induct three new mem­bers this evening. All were wel­comed with a hearty EOT Zoom hand­shake. These new mem­bers include PLG Denise Gasti of the CNH Dis­trict, spon­sored by incom­ing EOT Pres­i­dent Bob Larsen, DLG LaMis­sTenn, Lau­ra Gilliland, spon­sored by our Pres­i­dent (Past Inter­na­tion­al Trustee) Barb Thomp­son and PLG Jim Janosik of the Ohio Dis­trict, spon­sored by our Club Sec­re­tary and PG of CNH Alan Guire.

All three of our new mem­bers have worked hard to improve mem­ber­ship in their respec­tive Dis­tricts. We are extreme­ly pleased they have cho­sen to join our EOT e‑Kiwanis club.

Member Profiles

Joe Rug­ge­rio, the cur­rent Gov­er­nor of the Dis­trict of New York shared a few min­utes to talk about his life adven­ture. Joe was born in Brook­lyn. His father was a long serv­ing Kiwan­ian who even­tu­al­ly per­suad­ed his son to join Kiwa­nis 15 years ago. After serv­ing as his club Pres­i­dent, he sought to con­tin­ue to serve as LG and even­tu­al­ly to his posi­tion of Governor. 

Joe is a proud father of three and grand­fa­ther to five. He was left a wid­ow sev­er­al years ago and con­sid­ers him­self dou­bly blessed to have found a new life part­ner in Deb­bie Roth. A proud retired team­ster, Joe shared the impres­sion it had on him to have worked on so many New York struc­tures. Most impres­sive was the work he did at the Twin Tow­ers site post 911. 

Our sec­ond speak­er was Gov­er­nor Kendra Skid­more, Gov­er­nor of the Ken­tucky-Ten­nessee Dis­trict. She was east­ern Ken­tucky born and is pas­sion­ate about help­ing those in need. Her step­fa­ther was a Kiwan­ian and final­ly per­suad­ed her to join Kiwa­nis, for which we are very grateful.

A den­tal hygenist pro­fes­sion­al­ly, she is find­ing her time to be extra­or­di­nar­i­ly busy dur­ing Covid. For two year, she was on sabat­i­cal with Kiwa­nis as an amaz­ing club open­er. She is not afraid of a chal­lenge, a trail blaz­er and goal set­ter. She is just who we need to con­tin­ue our mem­ber­ship growth mission. 

Our final speak­er was Steven West­phal, Gov­er­nor of the Utah-Ida­ho Dis­trict. He is an elec­tri­cian and along with his sons, they run the fam­i­ly busi­ness. Gov­er­nor Steve is a retired army vet­er­an hav­ing served in Vietnam.

Steve exem­pli­fies what it means to have per­se­ver­ance and deter­mi­na­tion. Two years ago, he was diag­nosed with skin can­cer. How­ev­er, in his case, it was tru­ly unique in that it was under his tongue. His ensu­ing surgery includ­ed a pros­thet­ic jaw and loss of his tongue. He was told he would nev­er speak that did not stop Steve. We are thrilled that in June he was told there was no trace of cancer. 

Wel­come to our three newest mem­bers to the Eye of the Tiger team.

Upcom­ing Birthdays!

Sep­tem­ber is fast approach­ing as are many EOT mem­ber birth­days. Upcom­ing birth­days include a run of them at the begin­ning of the month. Sep­tem­ber 5 is Tim Shep­pard, 6 is Mary Jo Brubak­er, 7 is Dewey Smith, 8 is Mar­i­an Tay­lor and Don Koch with Richard Lim round­ing it out on the 9th. Mary-Lynn Des­jar­lais is cel­e­brat­ed on the 16th, Jim Doo­ley on the 17th and Car­son Schreiber on the 22nd. Wish you a hap­py, healthy year ahead!

To help out your eas­i­ly dis­tract­ed EOT newslet­ter edi­tor… please send sto­ries, pic­tures and ideas to me, Julia Levine. That real­ly helps me out immense­ly. Thank you!