Each 2025 issue of The Laurel will spotlight the people and businesses and organizations that are marking major milestones in this event-filled year.
Naturally, we must focus on The Rotary Club of Highlands, which is celebrating 80 years of Service Above Self here on the Highlands-Cashiers Plateau.
As Highlands Rotary President Randy Foster explains, “For 80 years, the Rotary Club of Highlands has quietly transformed the community – one project, one dollar, one helping hand at a time.”
If you’ve been reading us over the years, you know what Randy is talking about.
Just consider the Rotary projects that have enriched our neighborhoods and our neighbors:
Hurricane Helene Relief Efforts
Rotary Bingo at Highlands Community Building
Highlands School Students of the Month awards
Highlands Downtown Halloween Celebration
Olde Mountain Christmas Parade
Highlands School Teachers Supplies Financial Donation
Highlands School Athletic Banquet
Shop With a Cop
Veterans’ Ceremonies
They accomplish all this through clever fundraising, decades of wise leadership committed to the Rotary ideals, and a membership pledged to generosity.
Examples of those clever fundraising ideas that’ve earned prominent positions on the Highlands event calendar are the Fourth of July Ducky Derby, the Twilight 5K Run, and the Rotary Golf Tournament.
Think of the thousands of volunteer hours donated to these efforts. Think of the lives that have benefited.
On a personal note, let me offer a few standout moments from my time with the club:
The Rotary Club of Highlands sent my son Alex to Pamplona, Spain for his sophomore year of high school. Alex’s horizons were expanded far beyond the Plateau and his experience helped him assume his place on the global stage, culminating with three years in a remote Honduran village with the Peace Corps.
When (fellow Rotary member) Selwyn Chalker and Katherine Farmer and I approached Highlands Rotary about our notion for Downtown Trick of Treat, we were greeted with enthusiastic support from Jim Barton and the Rev. Carl Lindquist. Carl’s embrace was critical for winning over a lot of Highlanders, who were hesitant to support what they initially believed was a Satanic celebration.
Then there was the Highlands Rotary’s full-throated support of the Rotary Youth Exchange. In addition to allowing Alex to be fully immersed in the life of a teenager in Spain, it allowed my wife and I to play host to students from Taiwan, Spain, and, briefly, France. I’d like to think that we helped these young people to understand our country and our people in a far better light than they’d have received through American television and movies. They were an absolute delight.
And finally, I’m grateful to the club for inviting US Navy Captain Bob Phillips (Ret.) to speak at its December 7, 1993 meeting. Bob, who lived in Horse Cove, was stationed aboard the USS Ramsey, anchored in Pearl Harbor on that nightmarish day. His testament was horrifying and unforgettable and at the end Bob and several of us were in tears.
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