All News

Rotary Club marks 60 years in the community

Over the course of the last 60 years, Bill Simpson [FCA] has been involved in numerous projects around the city and internationally as part of the Rotary Club of Grande Prairie. But he’ll be the first to tell you that he received far more than he ever gave of his time. Rotary, he said, has made him a better person. “I try to think so,” he said. Simpson, 88, was one of the first members of the Rotary Club of Grande Prairie when it was chartered in 1951. He was the second chartered accountant allowed into the club and remembers the excitement of being made an official member. “It was a status thing, to start out with. You had to be chosen, you couldn’t just apply,” said the native of Edmonton, who moved to Grande Prairie in 1950 when the population was less than 6,000 people. He remembers the sense of fellowship and camaraderie that went along with the ideal of service above self that Rotary was built on. “They’re always there for you, there’s always somebody that you can rely on,” he said. “If you were sick they were there to see you and we did good work for others, so we had a sense of satisfaction.”… Those attending the event were encouraged to come dressed from any one of the first five decades of the club’s existence in Grande Prairie. “Throughout the evening we’re having a little salute to each of the decades that Rotary has been Grande Prairie, we’ll be looking at Rotary’s achievements, and a little bit about what was going on in the world as well,” said Karen Munjak [CA], president of the Rotary Club of Grande Prairie.
http://www.dailyheraldtribune.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=3080026

Grande Prairie Daily Herald-Tribune