Robin Chapman
Historic Bay Area Visionaries
Around the region that has become Silicon Valley, filmmaker Charlie Chaplin found inspiration, poet Robert Louis Stevenson uncovered adventure and Sarah Winchester built a house that would intrigue people long after she was gone. Author Robin Chapman shares fascinating tales of those who exemplify the enterprising spirit of the Golden State.
Robin Chapman is a longtime journalist who is a native of Los Altos, California. She earned her Masters Degree in journalism from UCLA, before setting out on a career in television news. She worked at KRON-TV in San Francisco and several other stations in the West before heading to Washington D.C. where she covered the White House, Congress and the Supreme Court for the ABC-TV station there. In 2009, she returned to her hometown and published California Apricots: The Lost Orchards of Silicon Valley, (History Press 2013). Her new book, Historic Bay Area Visionaries, also from the History Press (October 2018) is her fifth book, her second about California. She now writes for a number of local publications.
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Date: Thursday, September 12, 11:30 AM Shotgun Start
Register: Click Here
Price: $135 per player - includes green fees on the Falls Course, cart, practice range, prizes, post-golf appetizers - SJ Rotary Club members and Guests
$35 per player for Blackhawk members who are SJ Rotary Club members
Format: Shamble
Prizes: Cash prizes will be awarded to the winning foursome as well as the female and male golfers who win closest to the hole contests
Deadline: September 9
Questions: Audrey Fox or Sandy Swanson
Marie Barlahan is eager to meet and work with all the Rotarians as the new Membership Coordinator.
Marie grew up in the Bay Area receiving her Bachelor’s degree at Notre Dame de Namur University in Psychology and Sociology and her Master’s degree in Counseling from Santa Clara University.
She brings with her 20+ years of experience in the nonprofit arena developing, implementing and managing programs. She has extensive experience in community and organizational development. Her most recent work experience was with the Housing Authority of Santa Clara County as the Housing Programs Supervisor. Before that, she worked at Sunnyvale Community Services for 17 years. She was the Director of Operations/Volunteers for the first 11 years and later became the Director of Emergency Services.
She and her husband have three sons, ages 15, 13, and 11. Her boys definitely keep her busy and she is constantly working to improve her life/work balance. When time allows, she likes to travel, search for the best taco trucks and do some retail therapy!
Chris Missirlian was born and raised in Fresno, California. He moved up to the Bay Area to attend college and decided he was not going back. He received his bachelor’s degree in Economics from the University of California, Berkeley, where he also found a love for personal finance. He interned at Wells Fargo Advisors while still attending college. Upon graduating, he began his financial planning career as an advisor at Parkworth Wealth Management, Inc., an independent Registered Investment Advisor in northern San Jose.
After joining Parkworth, Chris quickly worked to attain his Certified Financial Planner™ certification. For the past four years at Parkworth, Chris has been working to be the best advisor he can, providing comprehensive financial advice to individuals, families and small businesses. He is also an active member of the National Association of Personal Financial Advisors (NAPFA), a professional association of Fee-Only fiduciary financial advisors.
When not working, Chris enjoys travelling, exercising, hiking, Giants baseball and spending time with family and friends in Fresno, the Bay Area and Carmel.
Rotarians and their guests were greeted by members of the Paws to Consider committee, which is chaired by Catherine Cook. President Karyn Sinunu rang the bell to start the 5,216th meeting, which turned out to be quite a bell-ringer for President Karyn. Brian Adams was the first to be struck for sharing the news that Bill Del Biaggio Jr. was being inducted into the Bellarmine Hall of Fame this month.
President Karyn shared a video recap of the recent wheelchair trip to Mexico City, organized by Josh Burroughs, and that was followed by the Upbeat News segment, during which Kathleen Thomas shared a story about a woman they met in Mexico.
Mick Greco and Gina Rodriguez handled the traveling mics to introduce visiting Rotarians and their guests, and President Karyn also announced that we were again permitted to applaud each guest -- which was a relief to everyone who had just been doing that anyway for the past month.
Brian Welch was next to present a segment of Rotary Law Beat, in which he talked about the shootings at the Gilroy Garlic Festival. One thing that worked in the aftermath, he said, was the establishment of a Family Assistance Center within one day of the shooting to provide services to those affected by the tragedy.
Next, Jaime Chavez introduced our newest member, Chris Missirlian, and we got an array of fun facts about him -- one of which, of course, wasn’t true. Jon Ball was called upon to suss out the false fact but couldn’t help himself and had to call out President Karyn’s mispronunciation of “Del Biaggio” earlier in the meeting, resulting in a bell-ring and fine (and President Karyn fined herself, too). It turns out our new member has never been to bartending school, but he is an avid gamer and has been tear gassed.
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Vince Sunzeri took the podium next to let us know that the Next Big Project Committee was up and running, though he thinks the term “Next Mini Project” would be more apt since we’re not expecting something like our last Big Project, the Rotary Playgarden. However, you should be receiving a survey by email about the project and members are asked to submit their feedback by Sept. 6.
President Karyn next showed us a quick black-and-white film of Jean Harris, aka Mrs. Paul Harris, serving tea at an outdoor Rotary function. The women will not be in that role at our upcoming Rotary barbecue, she assured us. Rick Alpers then came up to share some history about our Rotary barbecues, which have been taking place for a century. They were originally held on different ranches each year, and barbecue was then and remains now the menu. Some of our recipes go back some 80 years, Rick said. The next barbecue is Sept. 11 at History Park.
Four Red Badge members -- Zaraya Atayde, Michael Melillo, Ini Uboh and Ashis Khan -- came to the stage to receive their Blue Badges from President Karyn, who reminded us that when the Rotary History book is completed, members will be presented with a copy along with their blue badge.
Larry Stone -- boo! -- introduced our speaker and fellow member John Poch, executive director of the San Jose Sports Authority. Here are some highlights of John’s talk:
-- The Sports Authority was started when the arena was built as an agency to bring world-class sporting events to San Jose.
-- Among the events the Sports Authority has helped bring to the region just the year are the College Football National Championship game, the NHL-All Star Game and the NCAA Final Four regional. Those events and others brought in millions of dollars in direct spending for San Jose.
-- The Sports Authority’s two big community programs are the San Jose Sports Hall of Fame, which honors people from the sports world who are from the San Jose area or gained prominence here, and the REACH Youth Scholarship program, which provides scholarships to high school seniors who have overcome adversity through sports.
-- Asked about the potential for the Olympics to come to the Bay Area, he said the Sports Authority continues to work with the organizing committee in the Bay Area to make that a reality one day.
-- Finally, we’re all invited to honor Art Lund and Ray Silva for Rotary Day at San Jose State football on Sept. 7 at 6 p.m. at CEFCU Stadium.
President Karyn closed out the meeting with a slideshow of photos from the San Jose Jazz Summer Fest Rotary VIP event.
Respectfully submitted by Sal Pizarro, Meeting Summaries Committee
Photos taken by Jeff Faulkner, Photography Committee. Click here to see the full set.
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