Hi everyone.
Following on from our Spud in a Bucket, Robert Stuart read out a card from his grandson, Ardie O'Reilly who was our youngest grower
It's little things like this, that make it all worthwhile.
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Rotary Foundation - some more food for thought on the subject of Global Grants. Makes for interesting reading.
2022-23 Global Grants by Areas of Focus
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Our speaker for this evening and giving his member profile, was Gary Lewis.
Gary was born in 1948 in Auckland and he was the eldest of three children. He was brought up in Papatoetoe and spent many weekends and holidays at his parents batch at Big Bay doing lots of fishing and generally having a great time.
When he left school, Gary became an apprentice tool maker at Reid Rubber and worked in his fathers engineering business after hours.
From a young age, Gary developed a love of cars and car racing, racing as a teenager in the Benson &Hedges 500 at Pukekohe raceway.
Gary is married to Sue and they have two sons Chris and Brad and also have two grandchildren. Gary and Sue love to travel so have taken many trips overseas, including to Europe, Japan, Singapore, Australia and the Pacific Islands, as well as all around New Zealand.
Gary joined his brother in his engineering business around 1975 and they did maintenance for commercial companies in South Auckland and also built for construction companies. They developed a disc brake system for CF Bedford Vans that were being used for St John Ambulances, which they later patented.
Gary left the engineering business around 1980 and moved into the Motor Industry where he remained for over 20 years. During this time, he was fitting the disk brake conversions he and his brother had designed, to CF Bedford Ambulances and repowering them with V8 engines. He then went on to selling cars and worked his way up to Dealer Principal in the industry for approximately 20 years.
Gary joined Henderson Rotary in 2000.
Gary took a break in 2003 for a couple of years to travel with Sue but then she encouraged him back to work as he was getting under her feet. A good friend offered him a job with Power Solutions at NZ Generator Hire. The company grew substantially over the years and in 2011 was sold to Aggreko - a Scottish Generator Rental Company who at that time was the biggest in the world. NZ Generator Hire that Gary worked for, had the work for the 2011 Rugby World Cup and Aggreko wanted it. Gary retired in 2013 but was then head hunted by the owner of Generator Rental Services to help grow their business. He worked there for 6 years and Generator Rental Services is now the largest Generator Rental Company in New Zealand.
Thanks for a great talk Gary.
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Just a reminder that there is no Rotary on Tuesday night - please see below.
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