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How Dry I Ain’t: Prohibition – the Ignoble Experiment that Failed
Aug. 11, 2020
This year we celebrate the centennial of the beginning of the Volstead Act (1920 – 1933), the enforcement legislation of the 18 th Amendment. The Prohibition movement had its origins in the Northeast and Midwest, with very little enthusiasm in the West, and particularly in the San Francisco Bay Area. But it was the “Law of the Land,” and we had to obey its restrictions. The 13 years of Prohibition have been sensationalized, primarily because of gang violence and dramatic law enforcement methods in big cities and smaller communities in other regions of the nation. This presentation will focus on the less dramatic activities of citizens in our area, who found ways to circumvent what President Herbert Hoover called the “noble experiment” with a much more relaxed attitude. |
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"The White Devil's Daughters: The Women Who Fought Slavery in San Francisco's Chinatown."
Aug. 25, 2020
During the first hundred years of Chinese immigration--from 1848 to 1943--San Francisco was home to a shockingly extensive underground slave trade in Asian women, who were exploited as prostitutes and indentured servants. Julia examines this little-known chapter in our history--and gives us a vivid portrait of the safe house to which enslaved women escaped. Accompanied by historical photos from the book, she'll explore the Marin settings and people in her nonfiction book. |
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Exploring Whiteness
Sep. 22, 2020
Civil Rights Advocate Debbie Toizer will present Exploring Whiteness. She will discuss what it means to have a white racial identity. What are our implicit biases and how do we learn to recognize them in our daily interactions? Why is it so hard for white people to talk about racism? How do we have these conversations and still center black, indigenous and people of color in the movement for racial justice? |
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Avoiding Scams-Including Covid, Fraud, and Identity Theft
Oct. 06, 2020
Financial Scams/Fraud/ID TheftOak will enlighten and educate us on how to protect older adults and all ages against common financial scams. A 2018 study asserts that financial elder abuse costs $36.5 billion annually. In Marin County alone, financial abuse cases make up 32% of all referrals to Adult Protective Services. Nationwide it’s estimated that only 1 in 10 cases is reported. |
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Oct. 10, 2020
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The Mill Valley Song Turns 50! - Rita Abrams Shares Her Story.
Oct. 20, 2020
Two-time Emmy Award winner Rita Abrams describes how her smallest musical creation became the biggest legacy of her musical career.
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We’ve Voted. Now What? - Election Aftermath
Nov. 03, 2020
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Last Boat out of Shanghai and What that Great Escape Means for Today.
Nov. 17, 2020
Bay Area author Helen Zia discusses her latest book " Last Boat Out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Fled Mao’s Revolution" , a deeply moving chronicle of the extraordinary ordeals and exodus of four ordinary Chinese in a world torn by war and fractured by ideology. Their experiences in fleeing China and their struggles to survive as exiles and refugees in the US, Hong Kong, Taiwan and wherever the diaspora would take them are mirrored by an untold exodus of millions of others then and throughout human migrations from catastrophe, and will likely provide insights to people of Hong Kong and other hot spots today. Marin's Amy Tan, author of "The Joy Luck Club" noted: “Zia’s portraits are compassionate and heartbreaking, and they are, ultimately, the universal story of many families who leave their homeland as refugees and find less-than-welcoming circumstances on the other side. I read with a personal hunger...”
Her book was one NPR's "Best books of the year" and finalist for a national PEN America book award. As.the San Francisco Chronicle review wrote: "a fascinating read as a missing chapter of modern history finally coming to light. What makes the Shanghai story unique is that the real human cost of the massive exodus has remained a mystery. Official records, if any, are suppressed, and research in this area has been sketchy. " Last Boat Out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Fled Mao’s Revolution" . . . fills a gap in our collective memory.
Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/RotaryClubOfMillValley/posts/3384125631704995 |
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Honoring the Fallen
Dec. 01, 2020
One of the most important and least known duties in the Marine Corps and in all the other US military branches is the Casualty Assistance Call Officer. Headquarters Marine Corps utilizes a nationwide network to identify Marine officers and senior enlisted members for this duty. Once assigned, these Marines' primary duties is to notify the next of kin of fallen Marines. Once notification is made, these Marines are responsible for follow-up visits to explain military benefits and to provide military honors if requested by the family. These assignments are some of the most difficult in the Marine Corps. Every Marine in this duty understands this is the very least they can do to honor the service of fallen Marines and help families deal with the loss of their loved one. "Honoring the Fallen" explains this process and why it is so important to those serving and their families. |
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A Voice In The Wilderness--Medgar Evers & The Miss
Dec. 15, 2020
The Post Civil War Era ushered in the period of Reconstruction which lasted from 1865-1877. It was during this time, that swelled bereft masses of former slaves flooded the war torn South as bitter Confederate sentiments lingered. Due to Congress legislating the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, “freedmen” were indelibly engrafted into the nation’s social fabric as full citizens. The American ideology of race had seemingly found a tangible resolution. However, President Rutherford B. Hayes began withdrawing Northern troops from the former Confederacy in 1877 as a result of political wrangling. This ill conceived decision invited pernicious violence towards people of African descent for generations to come. Unimpeded intimidation, disenfranchisement and Jim Crow beset the hopes of so many for another one hundred years. The following century gave rise to the “Greatest Generation” that would produce new social leaders such as Medgar Wiley Evers who would recraft America’s Civil Rights narrative. Being born in 1925, he was a child of the Great Depression and eventually became a soldier during World War II. His tour ended after the successful D-Day Invasion and he returned home in 1946. Like his peers, liberal cultural experiences abroad nurtured within him a newly formed dignity that would not yield to the traditional racial norms of Mississippi. He obtained his undergraduate degree in Business Administration from Alcorn A&M College in 1952 and had accepted the state’s NAACP Field Representative position by 1955. After doing so, Evers relocated his young family from Mound Bayou to Mississippi’s capitol. Here, he became a voice in the wilderness.
Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page: |
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The Spirit of Sarajevo: A Story of Resilience
Jan. 05, 2021
For centuries, Sarajevo was known as a crossroads of cultures -- a peaceful place that valued a variety of religious traditions and ethnic heritages. It was a vibrant capital city that shone on the global stage and even hosted the 1984 Winter Olympics. But the rise of nationalism within former Yugoslavia led to a brutal conflict that threatened to wipe away the city’s legacy of openness and tolerance. For nearly four years, Sarajevo was under armed siege--the longest one of any city in the history of modern warfare. When it was finally lifted, Sarajevo was left a broken city marked by crumpled buildings … the scars of mortar shells … and shattered families beset by grief. Yet still, somehow, the spirit of Sarajevo never wavered. This book is a story of life under siege, created from unimaginable misery and degradation. It is a story about resilience and determination, which now, more than 20 years after the siege ended, serves as an example for all of us as we navigate a confused, frightened world of being “under siege” during this pandemic. Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page: |
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Angel Island, Guardian of the Western Gate
Jan. 19, 2021
John will provide a live program from the US Immigration Station, Angel Island. The walls of the historic detention barracks are filled with poetry, written and carved by immigrants expressing their feelings of frustration, anger, and hope. Historically called the “Guardian of the Western Gate” by immigration staff, the station is second in size only to Ellis Island in New York. The detention facility was built to enforce immigration laws of the era including the Chinese Exclusion Act. People from over 80 countries, were detained on Angel Island between 1910-1940, the largest groups were immigrants from China, Japan, Russia, and India. Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page: |
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Sail Cowabunga: A Family's 10 Years at Sea
Feb. 02, 2021
From Bordeaux France to San Francisco, California, her talk follows a Franco-American couple and their two young sons across the Atlantic Ocean and into a ten-year journey at sea. Through their adventures and misadventures, tragedies, and glories across four continents, the Couvreux family rarely had a dull moment living on the water. Janis chronicles in vivid and lively detail how they fended off a midnight intruder, sailed to the microscopic St. Peter and St. Paul rocks on the equator, explored the jungles of French Guiana and Devil’s Island, and sailed through Cuba in the turmoil of the late 80s. Their adventure was not without hardship, however, as Janis recounts battling medical emergencies that required sending her husband across the globe for treatment (twice), leaving her to single handedly orchestrate a Panama Canal passage amid pre-war chaos. While living in the close quarters of their 42-foot sailboat, the Cowabunga, the Couvreux family was able to maintain sanity and a normal daily routine of cooking, schooling, and sleeping at sea, knowing all the while that something unexpected might be waiting just around the next peninsula.
Please see more pictures on Mill Valley Rotary club Facebook page:
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