Rotary Club of Northern Bruce Peninsula News
Submitted by Rob Hiscott
Beginning on Sunday, January 19th and continuing weekly through the winter months (through March), your local Rotary Club will once again host Coffee Socials at Rotary Hall, from 10 AM to 2 PM each Sunday. Everyone is welcome to come join us for conversation over hot beverages (coffee, tea, hot chocolate) and light snacks – we hope to see you there!
Also on this coming Sunday, there will be a Harbourside Inside ‘Open Mic’ Concert at Rotary Hall from 3 to 5 PM.
A Celebration and New Initiatives – Rotary Review of 2024
Early last year, your local Rotary Club celebrated a milestone – our 70th Anniversary as a Rotary Club here in Northern Bruce, with a well-attended fantastic Celebration Event at Rotary Hall on April 13th.
There were a number of new Club initiatives which began in 2024. We sponsored a Rotary Exchange Student from Taiwan – Matthew arrived in Canada in September and will live here in Northern Bruce for a year with different host families each term, while attending Bruce Peninsula District School in Lion’s Head.
Your local Rotary Club held eleven Sunday Coffee Socials at Rotary Hall during Winter 2024, and will continue with these events beginning this coming Sunday!
We hosted the first Chili Cook-off at Rotary Hall in November 2024 raising funds towards the Bruce Peninsula District School trip to The Netherlands in 2025.
We hosted a New Year’s Eve Open House at Rotary Hall as “a casual community gathering to say goodbye to 2024 in the company of friends and neighbours.”
Rotary plans to continue each of these new initiatives in 2025, and seek out new ways to support our community of Northern Bruce! As well, a dedicated website was launched for our Rotary Club in February 2024 to support the objective of keeping our local community informed about Rotary events and activities before, during and after these events take place.
Ongoing Rotary Commitments to Our Local Community
Your local Rotary Club hosted four community Pancake Breakfasts and served close to 800 breakfasts during holiday weekends from May to September last year. We hosted and tended 36 Bars in 2024, for a wide range of events at Rotary Hall, Lion’s Head Arena and other venues. We sponsored eleven Trivia Night events held in 2024 at Rotary Hall.
We awarded five Scholarships (valued at $7,500 in total) in 2024 to graduating students of Bruce Peninsula District High School to help support their pursuit of post-secondary education goals.
We participated in the Ontario ‘Adopt a Highway’ program, helping with trash pick-up (along a four-kilometre stretch of Bruce County Road 9 between Lion’s Head and Barrow Bay, to help keep Northern Bruce clean!
We sponsored the second annual very popular and successful Oktoberfest celebration (September 28th) at Rotary Hall. And we sponsored the annual Lion’s Head Santa Claus Parade held on December 7th with over a hundred children (plus parents and relatives!) visiting Santa inside Rotary Hall after the Parade, where every child received a goodie bag from Santa’s elves. ‘Friends of Lion’s Head Library’ were also on hand to offer a new book to every child visiting with Santa!
Your local Rotary Club donated to the Northern Bruce community in 2024, to support students of Bruce Peninsula District School in different ways, to the Golden Dawn Seniors Home, and local community organizations such as Bruce Peninsula Hospice and area Food Banks. Rotarian Wendell Thomson completed his second annual walk to fundraise for local health care on September 10th raising nearly $52,000 for Brightshores – Lion’s Head Hospital!
For more details and photos on all of Rotary’s events and activities in 2024, you can check out the review on our Club website at https://www.rotarynbp.org/stories/rotary-in-review-2024
As always, our success as a service club is in large measure due to the wonderful support and generosity of the Northern Bruce community, and we are deeply appreciative of this! By participating in our Club activities, sponsoring with generous financial support, and volunteering time and effort towards Rotary events and causes, the Northern Bruce community helps our small club succeed – Thank you for all your help! We wish everyone all the best in 2025!
Looking forward to continuing to serve the Northern Bruce community in 2025!
