Potentate’s Notes December 2024

/in /by

Season’s greetings and Happy Holidays to you and your family,

It is that time of year to enjoy with family and friends and going to holiday parties. There are a few Christmas parties that some clubs and units are doing this year, especially at Zenobia’s Christmas Party which is being hosted by Tiffin Shrine Club on Saturday, December 14, at the Amvets in Tiffin.

It was great to see the 50-plus kids at the Children’s Christmas Party and I want to give a big THANK YOU! to Beth and Greg Grudzinski for chairing this event this year.

At this time, I would like to thank everyone who has given me support these last eight years in line. It has been very appreciated to all of you that have helped serve the Shrine with me. Thank you all for allowing me to be a part of your family and you my family.

This is one of your last chances to get circus ads and circus show sponsors signed up and turned in. If you have questions, please call the office.

If you like to play euchre, Patrol is hosting a euchre party which is open to anyone in the Shrine on Thursday, January 30, at 6 pm. Hope to see a lot of you there.

Do not forget to come out to December’s stated meeting for elec­tion of officers. Remember Nobles, the officers work for you, you do not work for them. Also did you know you can pay your dues payments in installments? This can be done monthly, quarterly and/or semi-annually. If you have more questions on this, please con­tact me.

I personally would like to congratulate the ladies on their Purse Bingo, for having another full temple. And last, but not least, please give Kevin and Renee the same help and respect you gave me, if so elected.

It has been a pleasure serving you Nobles.

Potentate’s Notes October 2024

/in /by

Nobles,

I can’t believe there are only a few months left of my second year and I would not change a thing. However, I did tell the Ma­sonic Bulletin Board Committee that I would stay on as an at-large member. We are gaining ground and very close to making the Bulletin profitable again. One of the main things that stands in our way is the continual increases of postage. If anyone has any questions regarding the Bulletin, please feel free to reach out to me instead of the office so I can address it with the board.

I would like to thank the members of Elf Khurafeh Shrine for coming down and helping us put on our very first Water Buffalo De­gree. Many thanks to our Recorder, John Mann, for starting our Quarry. Thank you to all the members who came to join this group, as I hope it will be very interactive and a good way to involve fam­ilies. If you were unable to make it, please contact John Mann for more information.

Following the Water Buffalo Degree that evening, we had Cigars Under the Stars with a few in attendance and a good time was had by all. During the event, we honored those who previously wore fezzes during a Fez Burning Ceremony.

Your Chief Rabban and myself attended Great Lakes Shrine As­sociation meeting in Ft. Wayne, and a good time was had by all min­gling with the other Shrine Temples. On September 25 we had the K of C Shrine Night, which is one of the longest running fraternal organizations in Ohio history. It was attended by your Divan and many Nobles of your Temple to raise money for each organization and make each other aware the purpose of each organization.

I would like to thank all the Nobles and people who helped sell tickets for the Sportsmen’s Extravaganza that we had on October 5. Nobles, if you have any new ideas for fund-raising, please feel free to reach out to any Divan member and discuss this. As you may be aware, our Circus is not as profitable as it used to be, and any game of chance we have to give half of our profits to a 501c3 (which we are not).

I would like to thank Dave Coy for his 15-plus years of service as our Treasurer, and wish him success in the NRA line. The Adult Halloween Party is scheduled for Saturday, October 26. This is al­ways a great time and I hope to see a huge turnout for the event as it seems like it has been a long time since our last Temple social event. On the next day, families are welcome to our Kids Safe Halloween event that is open to the public. Please pass the word to friends, family and neighbors. We would love to see a packed parking lot of trunks handing out candy, so please consider and bring your unit/club or just yourself to pass out candy.

Last, but not least, we are still struggling with membership. On Saturday, November 9, we will have a Ceremonial at Zenobia start­ing at 10 a.m. At our September stated meeting we were able to bring in four new members with a Cold Sands Ceremony.

Potentate’s Notes September 2024

/in /by

Hi Nobles and Families,

I can not believe another summer is past us. Where does the time go?? Imperial Session was attended well by your Divan and Past Potentates. Voting on issues went well, even though a few of us ended up with COVID coming home.

A great time was had at the Zenobia Mud Hens game by all who attended, but was disappointed with how few members/families we had there. I would like to thank Bob Young for chairing this event again. We had a Ceremonial at the end of July and brought in seven new Nobles. I would like to thank the Valley of Firelands for their help and the Zenobia Shrine Clowns for use of their building. We then had the Zenobia Youth Picnic the following day, which was attended well by the Rainbow Girls and DeMolay boys. Thank you to all who helped with this event and thanks to all the families who attended. Hopefully we are building more aware­ness of our youth organizations that will lead to future members of our organizations.

The Zenobia Shrine John Hoffman Memorial golf outing was en­joyed by all 13 teams that registered, and was a beautiful day to enjoy the course. I would like to thank all of our members and non-members to make the National Tractor Pull event a success to ensure raffle tickets are sold for our fall fund-raiser and to promote Masonry and Shrinedom to those who do not know about it. I want to give a special thank you to Ill. Sir Ty Stout, Steve Horton and Dave Hef­flinger, for ensuring all volunteers were taken care of.

Nobles and families, what does it mean to be a Shriner to you? For everyone, it is something different. But I am calling on our younger members to become more involved and learn more about your philanthropy that you wanted to be a part of. We are running out of members to volunteer for all of our activities and some are getting burned out. We need to keep the fire alive in all of us, but it takes MANY hands from ALL to get involved. We do several dif­ferent activities that you may find an interest in and are always will­ing to do something new. If you have an idea, talk to a Divan member and see how we can make this happen.

David Coy has resigned as our treasurer, but is still in the process of helping Georgia Durain learn the bookkeeping. I have now ap­pointed Past Grandmaster, Most Worshipful Brother Steven Grindle as our treasurer, who will be reporting our numbers to the nobility and then working with Georgia.

We are still looking for a Hadji Editor that pays $100/month for 10 months of the year. Our current editor is unable to continue due to health issues. Please reach out to any Divan member or Brage El­liott for more details. This job is really easy and is mostly just proof­reading and ensuring all units/clubs and others are submitting their monthly articles and receiving flyers from chairmen to be posted for upcoming events. The information is then sent to our publisher who does the layout.

GLSA will be September 19-21 in Ft. Wayne, Indiana, this year. This is very close this year and if you are interested in going or para­ding, please let me know. Finally last, but not least, please keep Sat­urday, October 5 available for our Sportsmen’s Extravaganza. We will need help manning this event, so please see Tom Binder or my­self, if you would like to volunteer. Any bit of time you can assist will be a help. If any clubs/units or lodges would like to have a side raffle table, please contact the office to get a registration form.

Illustrious Sir, Bernie Welniak, you will be greatly missed by all.