Steve Vaccarezza – What I did on my Summer vacation

Steve showed slides of four Greek islands that he and Dona visited – Crete, Santorini, Mykonos, and Rhodes.  He started with a map of the Eastern Mediterranean giving us a short  Greek history in the early centuries AD, and said he missed Tas Tousimis’s filling in the gaps of Greek history.  They visited Santorini Island where there was a volcanic eruption 3600 years ago.  (Carla said she and David had also visited there).  On Rhodes you could ride a donkey up to the Castle of Knights of St. John on the Acropolis where there is a medieval town with vary narrow street about ten feet wide.  They visited the Palace of the Grand Masters on Patmos Island where in the Book of Revelations Christ spoke to John through a crack in the roof.

Sean Pang – Teacher of the Year

Sean Pang, English teacher at Rockville High School, was selected by his fellow teachers as “Teacher of the Year 2016”.  At age 3 Sean and his parents immigrated to the US from Hong Kong.

NBRC Past President, Barry Thompson, was born in Jackson, Tenn. His father managed the Piggly Wiggly factory there making store equipment for franchisees of this forerunner of the post WWII supermarket. Barry completed high school, university, medical school, internship/ residency in pediatrics before being drafted into the military in 1968. He gave a power point presentation of his 30-year career in the US Air Force (clinician, educator, laboratorian, commander, and Command Surgeon) and his two interrupted retirements. Barry’s “Pollination Services” classification stems from his long relationship (1954) with honey bees.

The Montgomery County Student Construction Trades Foundation is a non-profit foundation established by local County business people to offer real life experiences to the high school students in the construction trades of masonry, carpentry, electrical, HVAC, plumbing, cabinetry, interior design, architectural design and project management. The Foundation purchases and develops land so that a house , that is built entirely by students, can take them out of the classroom and into the real world. Each house is sold quickly so that the proceeds can be used to purchase land and materials for the next house. North Bethesda Rotary Club has been involved in this Construction Trades Foundation over the past 40 years by board members of Carl Ecker, Charlie Nash, and Jay Davies.