On 22nd December Rotarians and Friends of Rotary entertained travellers at Huntingdon Railway Station, many joining in the carols whilst waiting for their train.

Rotarian Ken Walmsley was our club's contact with the speaker. He also led a couple of teams of club members in the Rotary year 2011-2012 to serve the homeless people of London with cooked breakfasts. On the first day 230 breakfasts were served.
According to Paul the average daily attendance for breakfasts of homeless people in and around London at the mission is 298. The total attendance of last year (2016) was 25,800. Paul also stated that those among the homeless who need it can also have hot shower, shave and fresh clothes.

87% of the homeless people who attend daily are males. There is a special day (3 hours) for homeless women. Paul also said how an alcoholic homeless man called Chris became the inspiration for the Whitechapel Mission project more than 30 years ago.

The second photo shows President Malcolm Lyons displaying banners of the two Rotary clubs in Gubbio (Italy), where some of our members who are also members of HGTA (Huntingdon and Godmanchester Twinning Association) visited during their recent trip to Gubbio.

Chris delighted everybody present with her brief but informative presentation on Rotary matters. She also praised our various community, vocational and international projects.
In the first picture our President Malcolm Lyons is presenting her with a cheque of £2000 as our club donation to The Rotary Foundation. Our joint Foundation/International Committee Chairman Philip Bell is also in the picture.
After lunch members visited the Huntingdon Community Centre in Ambury Road which is the education centre for persons with disabilities. They have a number of projects running including bicycle repairs and sales and garden produce.

Rotarian Barry Hackett (Rotary Club of Ashby-De-La-Zouch) gave a comprehensive presentation on the current status of Rotary's 'End Polio Now' campaign. The job is not finished yet. The world will be declared 'Polio Free' when there are three clear years of no new polio case after the last one.
He also distributed a leaflet titled 'Polio this week, at 20th September 2017' to keep everybody present up to date on the current situation of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI). A cheque for £500 was presented to Barry, our continuing effort towards polio eradication.

The meeting took place at The Grand Piano in Godmanchester. Music was provided by Peter Downes and Duty Rotarian was John Hurley. The speaker was Peter Thornton.
Peter is one of the trustees of the charity organization 'The 8th Earl of Sandwich Memorial Trust' and has been doing this job for 20 years.
The trust helps local individuals and organizations.
The meeting was delightful, the food was good and the atmosphere jolly. It was a sold out event.

Caroline gave a short but comprehensive presentation on British Red Cross saying it is one of the 190 societies of the world. She also showed by slides the various spheres of the activities of the Red Cross, which affect human lives 'All around the world and just around the corner'.

Organized by Rtn Mike Fowler on behalf of the Memory Café, 20 passengers took to the water aboard 'The Ladybird'.
The captain was Bob Miller and he had four crew members. One of the crew members was Rtn Bill Knight of the R C of St Ives.
Rtn Lesley Gumbrell and her team organized the delicious luncheon on board.
The total cruising time of three hours (2pm to 5 pm) went very quickly with a lot of singing and musical instrumental accompaniments.

Due to rain and wet weather Malcolm and Trish's 'Garden Party' turned into a 'House Party' and it turned out to be a very enjoyable occasion.
During a break in the weather visitors toured the colourful garden, the Busy Lizzies were particularly spectacular.

New member Jean Burbidge was proposed by President Malcolm Lyons and has joined the members of the combined Foundation & International Committee for the coming Rotary year.
She gave a very interesting talk of her involvment in the community.
The 'Objects of Rotary' were read by Duty Rotarian Bob Dearman.

Rotary's 'Coffee Morning' is organized by our club at the Old Bridge Hotel every 2nd Tuesday of the month from 11am. It was started in July 2016 by Rtn Malcolm Lyons and Rtn Keith Wood as a part of Rotary's 'Way Forward' movement to promote fellowship among its members and friends. The meetings are now run by PDG Rtn Dan Connan.
Everyone is welcome.

Ken Walmsley and I visited Huntingdon Primary School on Tuesday 11th July 2017, to present gift cards to three pupils who the staff selected for being kind and helpful students.
We attended morning Assembly, told the pupils a little about Rotary and then presented the gift cards. We were made very welcome at the school and it was a very joyful occasion. Report by Gloria Heywood.

Thursday 6th July lunchtime meeting brought the changes of club officers for 2017/2018.
Pictures:
Incoming President Malcolm Lyons being checked over after receiving the regalia from Joint President Gloria Heywood.
President Elect Mike Baker receiving his ribbon from President Malcolm Lyons.
Treasurer Tim Garner regains his regalia for yet another year.

As it was the last meeting of the year 2016-17 each of the joint presidents gave a short speech about their feelings of the year.
Joint President Gloria said she enjoyed the year very much. They were able to raise a lot of funds and could help a lot of charitable organizations and some needy individuals.

Joint President Margaret said she enjoyed the year fully but was especially delighted with the grand success of the club's 70th charter lunch at Buckden on 7th May 2017 of which she was the main organizer.

Speaker Alison Watson gave a short talk on her charity 'Small Steps', which deals with children with Down's Syndrome. She said her charity has grown a lot bigger and she has many more contacts.

Past President Rotarian Mike Baker organized a tour called the "White Rose Country Trip" between 15th and 19th of May 2017 for our club members, spouses and friends.

It was a very successful journey to some interesting parts of Yorkshire including the city of Harrogate.

Joint President Margaret, who was also on the trip, made the presentation of a framed picture of an area of Harrogate to Mike as a 'Token of Thanks' from the members for organizing the trip.

In the picture there is an ice cream kiosk on the right which delighted Mike and on the left there is the Harrogate Rotary Club 'Wishing Well' which is in a small stone building with metal railings on the door.

Susan O'Hara, who runs the Huntingdon Shopmobility Centre at the Princess Street Car park expressed her concern about the decision of Huntingdon District Council to cease the annual funding of the centre which requires in the region of £25,000 a year to continue to provide the valuable service.
Some of our members gave her a few useful suggestions how to raise funds from the public for the Shopmobility.
Her talk was very well appreciated by our members.

Pat Harrington of Huntingdon St John Ambulance receives a cheque of £300 to cover the expenses of coach travel with the cadets to London to attend the St John Ambulance Parade as well as to join the St John Ambulance annual event at St Paul's Cathedral.
Some of our members attended the function a few years ago as Pat was kind enough to provide them with transport in the coach.

Liam Johnson, General Manager of Huntingdon Racecourse stated that the total earnings from British Race Courses through in excess of 3000 races per year is £3.7 billion. Six to nine million people attend the races every year.
The Jockey Club has 59 racecourses. He also stated the horse racing income from Huntingdon racecourse was £2.7 million in 2016 and £2.9 million in 2017.
The racing takes place at the local course 18 times a year.
Liam was sincerely thanked by the club members for his useful presentation as well as for helping our club in fund raising at the Huntingdon Racecourse.

The Charter Lunch ceremony was held at the Buckden Millenium Community Centre on Sunday 7th May 2017
The singer is Natalie Davies. She is a Mezzo Soprano and a brilliant singer. The pianist is Marjorie Lowey, wife of Past President Rotarian John Lowey of the Rotary Club of St Ives.
The Paul Harris award recipient Ms Alia Watson who was unable attend was represented by her son who received the award on her behalf from joint President Gloria.
Speeches from District Governor Elect Chris Davies and President Elect Malcolm Lyons

Katherine Thompson, a teacher who has worked in the UK and abroad spoke of her experiences at the Rehoboth Childrens' Home in the Philippines.
She was so impressed with the culture and people of the Philippines that she decided to move there permanently to run the home for disadvantaged children.
She also mentioned that the name 'Rehoboth' has a biblical connection.

Pat Butcher is the chairperson of the 'Friends of Hinchingbrooke Hospital', which is a registered charity. The purpose of this organization is to raise funds for the Hinchingbrooke Hospital through various events and to provide a link between the hospital and the community.

Pat received a donation on behalf of our club and the local Lloyds Bank from Ms Joan AllGood (lady in the black). Lloyds Bank agreed to match the money raised at our recent Brampton Race Collection. We raised £1000 (Ken Walmsley) so Lloyds gave us another £1000 as promised, which was given to the 'Friends of Hinchingbrooke Hospital'.

Giles Tinkler gave an interesting presentation of the education project for children through schools in Gambia in which he and his wife Liz are deeply involved. He also stated that literacy rate in general population in Gambia is quite high by African standards.

Adrian Shepherd, head teacher of Ermine Street Church of England Primary School gave a comprehensive account of the landscape and the philosophy of the school at Alconbury Weald. His presentation was much appreciated by the audience.

Cecelia Ridall Bell, a 12 year old accomplished harpist gave a short recital before the meal and delighted everybody present.

Lt Edward gave a comprehensive presentation about the role of US military in keeping peace on earth. He also gave an account of the roles the US military airbase at Molesworth near Huntingdon played during the 2nd World War. It is still an active US military airbase and he lives there.

Amy Hayden, Volunteer & Fundraising Coordinator from the East Anglia Childrens' Hospice (EACH) gave an interesting and moving presentation of the work carried out by the organisation.

The picture shows Amy receiving a cheque on behalf of EACH for £200 presented by Joint President Gloria Heywood.

The Rotary Club of Huntingdon held their 8th annual Technology Tournament at Abbey College, Ramsey on Wednesday 8th February. This year the Tournament attracted entries from 6 different secondary schools in Huntingdonshire with a record total of 86 students in 22 teams. The Teams are entered in one of 3 categories: Foundation, Intermediate and Advanced, covering the full age range from 11 to 18. This year teams came from Abbey College, St Ivo School, Sawtry Village Academy, Kimbolton School, Ernulf Academy and St Peters School.

The students have no prior knowledge of the task which they will be assigned and are expected to analyse the requirement, draw up a suitable design and construct the machine within 4 hours. After lunch, each team has to demonstrate the machine that they have built to the judges. The teams are assessed throughout the day on the way in which they tackle the project and the performance of the machine when tested. A team of judges allocates marks for all aspects of the project including team work, quality of their design, documentation and the performance of the final machine. This year's task was to design and build an electrically powered vehicle which could remove debris from a pipe. This had to be constructed from a kit of parts, supplied by the Rotary Club, which included an electric motor, various pulleys and wheels and other materials for constructing the vehicle chassis.

All of the teams worked hard to design and build the machines and a wide range of solutions were produced, most of which were viable vehicles able to move through the pipe. The winning teams came from 3 different schools: the Foundation, Intermediate and Advanced categories were won by Kimbolton School, Ernulf Academy and Abbey College respectively. All of the students in the winning teams were presented with a Winner's certificate and the team received one of the engraved glass trophies which had been donated by Computer Miracle Ltd. The trophies were presented by the Rotary District Governor John Dehnel. The feedback from the students and their teachers was very positive and it was clear that they found the day enjoyable and instructive.

The winning teams were:
Foundation:       Kimbolton School   Oliver Greenhow, Molly Greene, Darcey Lancaster-Adlam, Angus Dent
Intermediate:    Ernulf Academy   Tom Evans, Lewis Howard, Emma Brown, Jason George
Advanced:         Abbey College     Dillon Bennett, Joseph Brown, William Kelly, James Thomas

Photographs:
1    General View of the Hall
2    John Hurley and Roy White from Huntingdon Rotary with District Governor John Dehnel and the Kimbolton School Foundation Winning Team
3    Ditto with the Ernulf Academy Intermediate Winning Team
4    Ditto with the Abbey College Advanced Winning Team

Club members celebrated with cake of course and reminisces of proud Rotary moments. Surprise room decorations by Paula.

Photo shows:
Gloria Heywood, Jason Ablewhite, Lakkana Yalagala (our newest member) and Margaret Hebblethwaite. A large number of high powered BMW motorcycles.

Jason Ablewhite, Police and Crime Commissioner of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough gave us a valuable and informative talk on the police work in his region.
This was followed by an interesting tour of the premises including the Control Room where all the 999 calls are received.
Thanks go to Rotarian John Hurley for organising the visit.

A cheque for £1270.00 was presented on behalf of Lloyds Bank and our club to the Huntingdonshire Volunteer Centre.

Picture shows from left to right:
Gloria Heywood, Anne Bunting, manager of Huntingdonshire Volunteer Centre, Mark Pettitt, manager of Lloyds Bank and Karen Burley of Lloyds Bank.

Rebekah and Michelle both representing the charity 'Small Steps' an organisation that supports families with or about to have a child with Down's Syndrome.

Michelle Clark, shown with daughter Mara is founder and COE of "Lose the Label" and has published an informative booklet to help women make an informed pre-natal decision about their babies if they are tested positively for Down’s Syndrome.

"Looking athletic in the gym"

Huntingdon Rotary Club joint President, Gloria Heywood presented a cheque for £400 to Head Coach, Paul Hall MBE at the Huntingdon Gymnastics Club.
The money was raised by the Rotary Club over Christmas with the help of Santa and his sleigh outside Tesco and will be used to sponsor Ella Tolley, a 16 year old gymnast who is working towards her Level 1 Coaching Award.

David Potter, Branch Manager of Waitrose in Huntingdon gave an interesting talk on the challenges and goals of Waitrose in Huntingdon.