Stories

Welcome to our newest member, Gari Skinner

I am 74 years old. I worked for Southern California Edison for 31 years in accounting, tax and financial forecasting areas. I retired in 2011. We moved to Reno in 2018 but were kind of unable to make many friends due to Covid.

My goals in joining Rotary are to meet people, make friends and to do so in a positive way for the community.

By: Scott Maylath

I stumbled upon the Virginia Living Museum about 6-7 years ago when I was looking to do a makeup Rotary meeting.  I did my makeup meeting with the Warwick Rotary who meet in Virginia Living Museum cafeteria in Newport News, VA.  It turns out that the Warwick Rotary helped fund and build the museum over 50 years ago.  

The Rotary Club of Reno Centennial Sunset is sponsoring an event, The Dogs of Rotary, to provide service dogs for Veterans. We are partnering with G.I. Dogs of the Humane Society to select dogs for qualified Veterans and the dogs and the Veterans will be trained together.

The Event will be held on September 30, 2017 and we will provide 25% of the net proceeds to the G.I. Dogs program. We like this approach because we will not only be helping a Veteran improve their lives, but we will be saving dogs as well.

Following is the obituary for Jim Annis' father.  Our hearts and prayers go out to Jim and his family.

Warren Macleod Annis passed away on December 21, 2013, of natural causes.  At the time of his death Warren had been living in Livermore for 2 ½ years after residing in the same house in Pleasanton since 1950.

Warren was born in Duluth, Minnesota, the last of six children of Roderick Dhu Annis and Ethel Foss Annis.  He attended Duluth, MN schools, graduating from Central High School  and Duluth State Teacher’s College (now the University of Minnesota ta Duluth) with a degree in Biology and a minor in Chemistry.  After graduating college in December of 1943 Warren attended the Naval Reserve Midshipman’s School at Columbia University in New York, NY, graduating June 29, 1944.

On July 3, 1944, he married Fannie Lambert, his college sweetheart, on his way to assignment to the Amphibious Base at Coronado, California.  Warren was then assigned to the USS Menard, APA 201, and spent time in the South Pacific arena during World War II, participating in the landing at Okinawa on April 1, 1945.  His ship also transported the first occupational troops in to Nagasaki, japan, after the dropping of the atomic bomb.

After World War II, Warren came to Pleasanton, California, in 1948 to work at the Jackson Perkins Company growing grounds as timekeeper and eventually became Office Manager.

In March of 1956, he joined the late Ernest W. Schween in the insurance business, taking over the business in 1963 upon the death of Mr. Schween.  Warren had an insurance office at 99 W. Neal Street, Pleasanton, CA, for nearly 30 years.

During his retirement, Warren delivered Meals on Wheels for 18 years and he worked in his woodworking shop, becoming an expert at the woodworking skill of intarsia, a form of wood inlaying that is similar to marquetry.  He and Fannie traveled the world and Warren loved playing bocce ball at the Pleasanton Senior Center.

Warren was the Charter Secretary of the Rotary Club of Pleasanton in 1965 and served as that club’s President in 1968-69.  He also served on numerous committees over the years.  In 2011, Warren was awarded the first Lifetime Membership ever given by the club and the club scholarship, which Warren helped found in 1967, was named after him, becoming the “Warren Annis Service-Above-Self Scholarship.”

Warren is survived by his children, Larry (Carolyn) of Pleasanton, CA and Jim (Gini) of Reno, NV, his grandsons, Greg Annis of Oakland, CA, Keith Annis of Lima, Peru, Kevin (Megan) Annis of Reno, NV, and Brian Annis of Burbank, CA, and his great grandchildren, Connor and Hailey Annis.

He was predeceased by his parents and five siblings and his wonderful wife of 68+ years, Fannie.

There will be a genuine Celebration of Life for Warren on Sunday, January 19, 2014 at the Veterans Memorial Building, 301 Main Street, Pleasanton, CA at 2:00PM.  Warren asked that in lieu of flowers, donations be made to:  Children’s Incorporated, 4205 Dover Road,  Richmond, VA 23221.

Sharon Zenz was working with the families of the Speech Contestants that took place on March 26, 2013, and shared a heart-warming story with our members.  If this story doesn't give you a clear focus for what Rotary does, nothing will. 

Rotary made its focus to eradicate Polio worldwide in 1979. As a result, there are only 3 countries left on the Polio endemic list:  Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria. You can truly feel the effect of this unless you had my experience. 

The Staten Island Rotary Foundation is accepting donations to help the victims of Hurricane Sandy on Staten Island.

Checks can be made payable to "Staten Island Rotary Foundation" and mailed to:

John J. Amodio
Chairman, Staten Island Rotary Foundation
212 Woodbine Avenue, Staten Island, NY 10314

A notation can be placed on the check indicating "For SI victims of Hurricane Sandy".

If you know of an organization or person that is collecting funds and wants the Staten Island Rotary Foundation to handle the distribution and provide them with a tax receipt; they can send checks to you and then you can forward the checks to John Amodio at the above address for further processing.

We have helped with the disasters involving the Tsunami, Haiti and Katrina; Please help us help our own Staten Islanders. Thank you in advance for all your help.