Tag: Knoxville Civic Club

  • Jacob Landis | Jacob’s Ride | Aug 8th

    Jacob Landis | Jacob’s Ride | Aug 8th

    Jacob Landis is a one man show that started in April of 2013 on a mission to raise money for people without insurance to get cochlear implants. He has ridden nearly 20,000 miles spreading awareness and raising money. Jacob has met with thousands of supporters and donors at over 120 events. Through his efforts and the generosity of their supporters, Jacob’s Ride has provided financial assistance for over one dozen cochlear implant recipients in the last five years. Over 12,000 children in America are born with hearing loss each year and cochlear implants are the most successful medical intervention for deaf or severely hard of hearing. However, insurance often does not cover the cost.  Jacob also meets with teenagers and young adults who are deaf or hard of hearing and insists to them not to let that “hearing problem thing” get in the way of identifying goals and pursuing your dreams.

    John Kerr shared with us Celebrate Sound Walk will be on September 9th (this is a Sunday) at 4 p.m.  They have moved the event to Tyson Park trying to make people happy that didn’t want to drive to Maryville.  That means that everyone that complained must show up.  He took down names.

    Jerry Winston announced we had members that participated in the Helen Ross McNabb – Shooting event.

    Next week is the monthly board meeting. Time is 6 pm, on Tuesday at Chesapeak’s.  All are welcome.

    Next Week:  Rebecca Koszalinski, our speaker, is being brought to us by Lee Freeman.

    #knoxsertomaclub #knoxvilleTN #CivicClubKnoxville

  • Sandra Clark | Election Predictions | Aug 1st

    Sandra Clark | Election Predictions | Aug 1st

    The election is behind us and I was pleased with the outcome. We made the national news – it was reported we elected a professional wrestler as mayor. Seems the “scruffy little city” just can’t get a break.  All of Sandra’s predictions came true and I got the feeling she is definitely not a President Trump fan.

    I would be willing to bet even if he knew it wouldn’t keep him up nights.  I worked at West Valley Middle School. We voted a total of 501 persons and 2 of them were my daughter-in-law and granddaughter (her first-time voting).  One picked Republican and the other Democrat, they should have stayed home!

    It’s much harder when you have two candidates running for the same office and you really like both.  I was impressed with Mattock and Burchett really “pounded the pavement”. You couldn’t go to any function he didn’t show up too.  Sandra seem to think he (Burchett) plans to move on up.  We can sit back and say “I knew him when. . . . . “

    The cost of campaigning I’m sure keeps a lot of good people from running. Sandra said thousands of dollars had been spent (this is a matter of public record, how much they spent and where they got it) and wouldn’t you love to be a fly on the wall after and election you lost and have the wife say – “don’t ever mention how much I spend on shoes again”

  • Detective Loeffler | June 27th

    Detective Loeffler | June 27th

    Detective Loeffler was a hoot. Got a little gory in places but most interesting. He also told us last year they (Knoxville Police) had 247,000 violent crimes reported with 12 investigators to handle them. Some were down right funny (if your not involved with the people) and some fall into the category of too stupid to live but not bright enough to kill themselves either.  The attempted suicides were down-right funny (again if you don’t know the people) .

    Dr. Asp shared with us he has 20 South Korean students here studying with him.

    Matt Hall brought his son, Ashton with him and Adrian Block a fellow worker.  We can only hope he was so impressed with the program he will want to join.

  • Bill Robinson | POW Vietnam | May 30th

    Bill Robinson | POW Vietnam | May 30th

    When Hell was in Session

    Bill Robinson spent seven and a half years in a Vietnam prison and fortunately lived to tell about it.  He and other prisoners’ motto was return with honor and they were able to do that also.  He does not think highly of President Johnson and thinks even less of Jane Fonda but does seem to like President Nixon. He was a crew chief on a rescue helicopter on a three-month rotation and on one mission they took enemy small arms fire and were captured.  Upon arrival at the prison the highest-ranking person told him to “live to fight another day”.  They eventually ended up in the Hanoi Hilton when the moto was never give up, never give in. The” Hilton” was proud of the fact they fed the prisoners on twenty cents a day. They survived by saying “we’ll be home by Thanksgiving, Christmas, etc. When President Nixon took office, he invited all the prisoners of war families to the White House and vowed to do all he could to bring them home.  When Bill was finally able to return home, he was told not to wear his uniform and they would land at night.  I hope all of us are properly ashamed of ourselves for allowing this to go on.

    I did not get a report on our service project, but I understand it was a success and possible we will learn more next week.

    Next week we will have the new person in charge of Knox Heritage to bring us up to date on what’s going on there.

    On June 20 we will have our own Becky Massey and on

    June 27 we will host a homicide detective.

  • Glenn Jacobs | Running for Knox County Mayor | Jan 24th

    Glenn Jacobs | Running for Knox County Mayor | Jan 24th

    I was so late arriving, I even missed lunch!  However, I did get there in time to hear our speaker, Glenn Jacobs, and I was impressed! First off, he’s a hunk which as I had been told he was a wrestler in a former like which colored my thinking. The few wrestlers  I have experienced in my life time did not look like him.  Next. he made perfectly good sense and he has some good ideas.  He made three points:

    1. Everyone has a unique skill set. We all have our own “talents” and if we try something and it fails, try something else!  He wanted to go “pro” but blew out his knee.  He said he was depressed for a time but finally got up, dusted himself off and determined to fine something new.
    2. Failure is important. You can’t have the rainbow, without the rain.  If you aren’t willing to fail, don’t get in the game.  When the government gives you everything; we encourage people to fail.
    3. There ain’t no free lunch. I couldn’t agree more.

    He is running for County Mayor – at this point I can safely say I will vote for him! He Is a small business owner which gives him a “head up” on what they face. I don’t know how Jerry Winston knows him, another career change?

    Maurine Bodes from the Interfaith Health Clinic was a visitor explaining the “Sweets to the Sweet” fund raiser. For Valentine’s Day. The Inter Faith Clinic’s mission is to provide accessible, affordable, and quality health care to the working uninsured and undeserved in our community. These services are provided regardless of race, sex, creed, age, religion or national origin.  Instead of sending flowers (or better yet, along with) they will deliver a mini Bundt cake to whomever you pick and with the purchase a patient visit to Inter Faith Clinic will be provided in your honor.  Give them a call, (865)546-7330.

    Housekeeping:  Bob Rentenbach read the prayer, Matt Hall led the pledge. Along with Maurine from Interfaith we also had Rob Link, Glenn Jacobs campaign manager, and Katherine McKinney (Mike’s wife).

  • Bethany Lovato | Elkmont Exchange | Jan 3rd

    Our speaker on Wednesday, Bethany Lovato, part owner, in charge of marketing and all around nice person, with the Elkmont Exchange brought samples!  They got their start in Viet Nam and lived there for several years. They are a company of three persons:  Bethany, Alex Violette and Brian Davenport. Seems the men have been friends for years, one was into food, the other beer. They determined to combine their talents and opened a restaurant that servers food and beer.  It worked, and they now have several locations to include the first one in Viet Nam that is thriving. They had to learn to make not only bread but also butter as these items were not available locally – see how lucky we are? Everything was going well until their daughter was born and they decided to return home which was originally Knoxville. They have purchased a house in North Knoxville that they are restoring to its original beauty and hope this will be a forever home.  Go check them out, they are located at 746 Broadway  between the cleaners and Broadway Baptist Church, open seven days a week for lunch and dinner.

    I didn’t get information concerning who will be our speaker for next week, but rest assured he/she will be great. Come check them out.  For the record: Bob Rentenbach read the prayer and Brett Grimm led the pledge, we had a measly twenty something that came. My table was empty except for Dr. Jerry and Chris Hoosier.

  • Mayor Tim Burchett | September 27th

    Mayor Tim Burchett | September 27th

    Matt Hall is responsible for bringing our county mayor to us. I think we should start a petition to keep him as mayor, he has done an excellent job and done it all without raising taxes. Not everyone is pleased with his progress, he get sued on a regular basis, top is 3 times in one day and gets death threats on occasion. However, he has built 2 new schools, spent 3.5 million on paving, managed a raise for deputies; and reduced the work force by combining services.  When entertaining persons considering relocating their business to Knoxville he takes them to Wrights Cafeteria;  that way they get some good hometown cooking and get to meet people they will be working with.  He says Knoxville and the people sell themselves. He plans to run for congress and personally I wish him luck.

    Grid pick:  This is getting harder every week, seems we had a five-way tie but the winner with 10 out of 10 – Al Gill.  We had 1.5 visitors; Matt brought his wife Sasha and our newest Sertoman in training  baby daughter Adalyn.

    According to my list Caroline Grimm is responsible for our speaker for next week and either a) she didn’t want me to know who it is going to be or b) she forgot and she doesn’t know who it will be.  Let’s all show up and find out together.

    Mark your calendars: On the 18th of October we will be meeting at the Southern Railway building. That will be the Wednesday after Oktoberfest.  Getting close!

  • Sandra Clark | Knox TN Today | August 16th

    Sandra Clark | Knox TN Today | August 16th

    Sandra Clark, introduced her latest publication KnoxTNToday.com. Formerly with the Halls Shopper which came to be just “The Shopper” and spread out to Fountain City, Powell and several surrounding areas.  She sold these publications to Scripts in 2005 but continued to be the go to person for editorial and content until they decided they could do all this without her.

    She hopes to beat out the Sentinel at the one-year mark. It would be nice to have a “local paper” again.

    I worked with her for a couple of years until she decided she could do it all on her own and she was right!  She was also a state legislator for several years and a real fun person to spend time with. She brought one of her partners with her, Shannon Kerry. Shannon got her introduction to newspaper reporting when Sandra sent her out to investigate a “lost chicken”.   I think it’s safe to say the Sentinel has their work cut out for them.

    Report on the board meeting:  The bad news is the dues are going up.  $180 for regular members, $160 for lifetime and I failed to get the others.  As most of us fall into the first two categories The increase will take effect in October. They decided to donate to the veteran’s foundation and we will receive some type of recognition.  Speech and Hearing are hosting a fund raiser on October 27 and we will most likely have a table at that event. Our major fundraiser, Oktoberfest is scheduled for October 13.

    Mike Simpson made Matt Hall an official member of the club.  He was presented with a pin and officially made a member in good standing.

    Next week:  Our speaker is Becky Ashe, principal of L&M STEM Academy. She spoke when it first opened and she is going to give us and update.

  • Meeting 2-1-17

    Our speaker, Rodney Norvell, is with the Baptist Collegiate Ministry that  and caters to all faiths of students attending the University. Their main objective is to give students a place to come, meet other students, make friends and hopefully in the end lead them to Christ. They actually own their property, which is on Melrose Avenue and is the childhood home of Victor Ashe. As such they do  not have to “get approval” but the object of the game is to be a part of the program not a problem.  They work in the community to help out where needed and last year traveled to Baton Rough to help in disaster relief and most recently in Gatlinburg. They are getting on the job training on how to be good citizens.

    Lots of good stuff coming up soon so get ready to roll up

    your sleeves and join in:

    February 16-18: Annual Convention in Kansas City.  Gives you an opportunity to check out the Headquarters where it all started.

    March 12th  – St. Patrick’s Day Dinner & Concert

    April 22nd – Celebrate Sound walk @ the Maryville Greenway

    May 20th  – Biscuit Festival (It’s not written in stone that we will participate but just in case, get ready.)

    June 25th – Return to Jerry’s lake house for the annual picnic and awards. The date is not written in stone but you’ll hear it from me if it gets changed.

    November 9-12- The Regional Convention in Florida which is being coordinated with the return of the Blue Angels to home base.

    During July, August, September and October your on your own to find something to do, we have done all we can!

    Housekeeping:  Jerry Winston prayed, Bob Rentenbach led the pledge. Next week Marianne is getting the speaker and had a good one on the hook but was waiting for confirmation. Come Wednesday and see if she was successful.

     

  • Meeting 11-9-16

    Lee Cottrell, our speaker, gave us another reason to protect our hearing. It’s now been connected to dementia which as you get older we worry about more than dying of cancer.  He says fifth million people have a hearing loss, more men than women and the older you get the more of a problem it becomes.  Hearing affects the quality of your life and if you have a problem you tend to be more withdrawn and basically withdrawn from social gatherings and people.  He went to show us some of the improvements in hearing aids but the cost is expensive and a lot of insurance will not cover it.  He was most grateful for our loaner program.  We may be glad of it in the future also.

    Board meeting, Tuesday, November 15 Chesapeake’s @ 6 pm

    Next week:  Father David from Sacred Heart Cathedral will be out speaker. He is brought to us by Bob Rentenbach. After the nasty way people have acted over the election I think we can use a calm voice. The week of Thanksgiving we will not have a meeting.  Mark your calendars so you don’t show up to find out nobody is here.  The first week of December will be our annual Christmas program with the Doyle High School Madrigal Singers. This is always a highlight of the season and a good time to bring friends or perspective members (or both).

    Record keeping:  Chris Kerr read our prayer, Allie Harmon led the pledge. Chris brought his wife Karen, Mike McKinney brought his wife Catherine, our representative from UT was Katie Faulkner, Associate Profession of Audiology and Brett Grimm brought a friend and brand new lawyer Patrick O’Neal.