President's Letter    

President Jim Petry 

July 21, 2008 

Aurora Evening Lions Club members, 

     This is the first official month of my term as your club president.  We just enjoyed a wonderful club picnic at Lion Galen’s last Saturday and what better way to start off a new Lion year.  I want to thank everyone in the club for giving me the opportunity to serve as your president and I appreciate all those that accepted the invitation to serve as officers, board members, and committee chairs.  I also want to thank Lion Lynn Miller and her board for the fantastic job they did last year.  Under Lynn’s leadership we had a great year of fundraising, undertook new projects such as VNA, continued to support many other projects, brought in new members, and received numerous awards from the District.  We celebrated all these achievements at our Charter and Awards Night in June.

     This year I want to continue to the same strong effort and focus that has made our club so successful in the past.  We will not give the same funding support to all the same organizations as we scrutinized the organizations more closely and entertain new ideas.  But I want to see the same spirit of volunteering, working together, and having fun that has been the tradition of this club to be more evident this year than ever.  An excellent way to begin is by supporting the Brewmaster Dinner event on August 24^th.  The Brewmaster dinner is new this year and a lot of effort has already gone into securing raffle prizes and printing tickets & posters.  This event has great potential to be a very enjoyable and successful evening and I ask the whole club to support it. 

     I’ll close with this parting note that was included in this year’s directory as the AELC President’s Message: ”Let us continue to be one of the highest per capita funds contributing Lions Clubs in Illinois and have more fun than ever.”

Thank you,

Lion Jim Petry

President Aurora Evening Lions Club    

President Lion Lynn Miller

     June 10, 2008

     President Lion Galen Hatcher

     June 10, 2006 

Aurora Evening Lions Club members,

       First, I want to thank the club for allowing me to serve as president. I consider this an honor and will give it my best effort. I also want to thank the incoming board and committee chairmen for their support and willingness to accept the responsibilities for the upcoming activities. All of the members that I asked readily offered their time, talent and ideas. We should all be very proud to be associated with the quality of people in this club.

     This coming year we will be expanding our speaker topics. We now have a great facility for meetings here at Jason’s. I know that we can exceed Lion Jim’s record of four new members this year. That will be up to you. We need the new ideas and energy that new members will bring.

     When you pick up your new directory, I want you to look at what we accomplished last year. Think what we could do with twice as many members! All of that and more would be possible if we brought along a friend each month for two hours fun, food and entertainment.

     Finally, I’d like to thank Lion Jim and Bonnie for all of the time and effort they put in to make this an incredibly successful year.

Lion Galen

Words from District Governor Larry Krebs

Excepts from the 1-J Lion Family Journal, April 2002

As I write this column, Evelyn and I continue to bask in the warmth and love poured out on us at last weekend’s District 1.4 Convention. 

The LIONS of our District are simply the best in Lionism. Thank you for your support and advice in the past and in the future. We love you all. As announced at the Convention, the winners of the Lions Club of Year Contests are as follows:

Leo Club of the Year— South Elgin Leo Club

Lioness Club of the Year— Bensenville Lioness

Lions Club of the Year (Less than 26 Lions) - Richmond Lions

Lions Club of the Year (26 - 50 Lions) - West Chicago Lions

Lions Club of the Year (More than 50 Lions)- North Aurora Lions Club

The Contests were hard fought and all Lions Clubs, Lioness Clubs, and Leos Clubs are to be congratulated for their efforts during the past nine months. You are all the greatest. I truly wish I could have announced more awards. The results will be published in the May District 1-J Journal.

With our Convention now concluded, I am working to finalize the planning for the Lions Year 2002-2003. There is still much to do. As I announced at the Convention, my theme for the year will be:

Building a Brighter Future

with the Hearts of Lionism

In this theme, each individual Lion is one of the Hearts. It is through each of your individual and collective efforts that we will Build that Brighter Future. One of my em­phases will be on our Lions of Illinois Foundation Endow­ment Fund. I will address this in a future article. Another goal will be membership. Not just, through new Lions, but through Recalling Retired Lions. This, too, will be covered in a future article. Another goal will be to have time in everything we do in our lives, not just as Lions.

Evelyn and I look forward with eager anticipation to serving with you during the coming year. May your sails always be full and may the wind always be at your backs. May God Bless you all and May God Bless America.

Yours in Lionism,

Lion Larry Krebs