Our History 1970-1984
The Club was sponsored by the Optimist Club of San Diego. Fred Michaud was the sponsoring club’s president and was very active in getting the club started. Dave Nash was the acting chairman and Rae Madson was acting Secretary-Treasurer. The first meetings were held in the Spring of 1970. Neil Butler was the Zone Lieutenant Governor and took a great interest also. Both Fred and Neil attended most of the formation meetings at La Avenida restaurant.
On September 28, 1970 the club finally had enough charter members signed up and a charter and installation meeting was held at DINO’s. Dudley Williams, an OI Vice President, was the installing officer. Bob McFarland was the field representative for Optimist International and he came down to Coronado from Daly City to help us get off to a good start. He spent the better part of three days helping us set up the books, get the supplies and understand the objectives and working of OI. The first budget was $2100.
On November the 21st the club held its charter dinner at the Hotel del Coronado. Dudley Williams was the master of ceremonies and Governor Stan McCarrey, Governor-Elect Neil Butler and President Clyde Powell of the Downtown Club were in attendance.
Our History 1984-1989
Dave Munns took charge following an excellent year under Larry Bunce (honor club, 62% attendance). When Dave missed a meeting on a few occasions his vice presidents Joe Adkins (Optimist of the Year, 1983-84) or Casey Reynolds presided ably. The Board consisted of Jerry Kirchberg, Ed Crow, Hil Sherman, Bob Hoppe, Bill McClure and Bill Stark. Wynn Foster and John Freeman continued as Secretary and Treasurer, respectively.
The Club Bulletin achieved its customary quality under the editorship of Hil Sherman, with Bill McClure filling in half a dozen times while Hil ran around the country. Dave Nash resumed duties of clip artist while Don Eibert gleefully collected the fines. Dave Blumenthal received the club’s first gold ding pass because he is in the news so ofter that it’s embarrassing to take his money.
Recollections and Factoids
When asked by Cynthia to speak, she suggested that since today is the first day of a new Optimist year, that I talk a bit about our Club’s history. I agreed with one caveat. Since the prepoinderance of our informal, written history can be found in the “Club Milestones” section of the Handbook and Directory (which I commend to your reading), we agreed that I should speak from memory of my recollections and experiences, recreating what I could of our history, and presenting everything mostly as a series of facts.
A lot of our history can also be found in annual scrapbooks. But more about the scrapbooks later.
And so, here we go!
