George English – 400th Anniversary of the Mayflower

President Katrina welcomed everyone to the meeting, including the speaker for the evening, George English.

Katrina then moved on to her “Interesting Rotary Information” section highlighting a who would be giving a presentation on the 400^th anniversary of the Mayflower.

Interesting Rotary Information:

President Katrina highlighted a link to the “National Library of Israel” that appeared in the District News for Clubs last weekend.

The article dealt with the history of vaccines against polio.

The first safe and effective polio vaccine was developed by Jonas Salk.  It was administered by injection and was first approved and widely distributed in the USA in 1955. However, another Jewish medical researcher named Albert Sabin was developing a polio vaccine that could be administered orally.  The benefits, compared to Salk’s vaccine included cheaper production costs, longer lasting immunity without the need for “boosters” and it was much easier and more practical to use for mass inoculations, especially in poorer countries where sterile syringes were not readily available.

Sabin’s vaccine largely replaced Salk’s vaccine worldwide from the early 1960s.  Salk’s vaccine has remained in use and was certainly a critical breakthrough in terms of dramatically reducing polio.  However, for most of the second half of the 20^th century, the oral vaccine developed by Sabin is what facilitated the nearly complete global eradication of polio.

Neither of the men patented their discoveries, seeing it as a privilege and purpose in life to help save millions of people from polio.

Katrina then handed over to our speaker, George English, who talked on the 400^th anniversary of the voyage of the Mayflower from England to Massachusetts.

George gave the history of the religious background that lead to 102 Pilgrims boarding the Mayflower in September 1620 to sail from Plymouth, across the Atlantic Ocean to the “New World”.  It was a rough crossing, taking 66 days, on a ship that had been built for transporting cargo not people. The average age of the Pilgrims was 32.  The oldest one was 64 years old.  George showed a short video illustrating the structure of the Mayflower.  The ship eventually landed in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, where the Pilgrims set about establishing a colony of just over 100 people. 

The “Mayflower Compact” was drawn up to establish the rules and regulations under which the people of the colony should live.  The winter of 1620/21 was very harsh.  They had to construct shelters to live in and, having landed at the beginning of winter, they had no crops to rely on for food.  Half of the Pilgrims died in the first three months.  However, the colony became established and grew to over 3000 within a few years as more people arrived from England. Amongst them were those with skills to enable the community to grow.

The Mayflower returned to England, but by 1624 it was a ruined wreck.  More information about the Mayflower and the Pilgrims’ story can be found at www.mayflower400uk.org  

After George answered a number of questions posed by the members, Tom Agnew proposed the vote of thanks.

Report on Honorary members:

President Katrina had received a lovely letter from honorary member, Bob Craig. He is well and he and his family have avoided Covid. He is looking forward to the lifting of restrictions. Bob sends his best wishes to the Club.

Callan Dick had talked to the representatives of the seven Rotary Clubs in the West Area at the meeting on Tuesday about the plans for “Wrap Up Lanarkshire”.  He had received a positive response.  The ADG linked to the Lanarkshire Clubs in D1230 was also at the meeting.  By the end of April, each of the Lanarkshire Clubs in D1020 and D1230 were asked to inform the appropriate ADG of their Club’s decision regarding involvement in the project and the name of the Rotarian in their Club that would serve on the organising group.

Vote on Redistricting:

Each member voted on whether or not to allow the District Team to enter into discussions with D1230 regarding the merging of the two districts into a new district as of July 2022.

94% of our members voted “yes”. Secretary Ian will inform District of the Club’s decision.

Foundation: