Janesville Blackhawk Golden Kiwanis

Blackhawk Golden ‘K’ General Meeting
Minutes
January 14^th, 2026

Past President Roger Wilcox presided, and called the meeting to order with a ring of the bell at 9:30AM.
28 members were in attendance today.

The meeting was led with the singing of America, the National Anthem and the Pledge of Allegiance.

Invocation: Carl Cramer, mentioning our venue, and the children.

Raffle: John Janes oversaw the ticket sales and drawing this week.
The weekly pot was $12 and the big (Joker) pot was $149.
Luci Cramer drew a ticket from the bucket, ticket number 1316.  Congratulations to the winner, Ryan Lewis.
The deck of cards has 40/53 cards remaining.  Ryan Lewis drew the Q♦.

Roger Wilcox thanks greeters Ryan Lewis and Bob Knudson, invocator Carl Cramer, rafflemaster John Janes, and server Bob Knudson.

Happy Box: Dave Figi announced he is happy because Ryan Lewis and another individual helped at Ron Shuler’s place.
Ryan Lewis announced he is happy because he won the raffle, and is donating the proceeds to the Truck on Ice!

Jokes: Joker Steve Skelly had a good joke about someone in a hotel trapped (via a DnD sign).
Roger Wilcox had a good joke about pie rates in the Caribbean.

Member Health: John Janes had a status update on Ron Shuler, who is now at St. Elizabeth’s.
Member Health: John Janes had a status update on John and Nikki Bennett, who have influenza.

John Janes, Roger Wilcox, and Jenny Turco have birthdays this month, and a song was sung.

Committee Reports: John Janes announced the Truck on Ice has collected nearly $3,000 in ticket sales.  Upcoming table sales locations are Sentry, Lion’s at 14 and 51, and the Janesville Athletic Club.

April Wright introduced the day’s speaker, Lieutenant Jason Rysdyk of the Salvation Army.  Lieutenant Jason has been married for 23 years.  He and his wife both spent two years to become ordained pastors.  They now run the Salvation Army in Rock County.  Salvation Army is a faith-based first organization.  The Lieutenant proceeded to share information about the organization.

The Salvation Army was founded in London in 1865.  It was created as a means to get people out of the pub and back into church.
William Booth pulled people out of a pub and gave a sermon in the street back then, a practice that is now made yearly.
The organization has been here since 1885.
Salvation Army hosts a cold shelter.  Two weeks of last year, it was available from 6PM to 6AM.
Grant money from e. g. the United Way assists running a food pantry three times weekly, MWF 12-1p.  Beloit accomplished the same on T/R 12-1p.
Rock County is one of only two in the nation that run their kettle campaign fully supported by volunteers.  As an example, Chicago pays some individuals $15/hour to accomplish the task.
One person in the area raised greater than $18,000, and another competed with him and exceeded $16,000.
The organization receives over $40,000 via organizations like ours.
The pantry is sourced from Second Harvest (which costs them), and ‘Retail Recovery.’
Beloit doubled their pantry this year, and one day alone was over 80 shopping carts worth of support.
The two area retail stores are independent of the local groups, and go to Rockford for addiction support.
In one month, $24,000 was required for rental support.
Salvation Army has transitional housing, on Holiday.  The offering is six units large: one of them stays flex, and three more are currently occupied.
Emergency Disaster Response is provided, e. g. for the Holiday shooting this past year.
Activities supporting Salvation Army include the Women’s Auxiliary Sales, and the postal service’s ‘Stamp Out Hunger.’
Kiwanis member John Janes asked, “The food pantry at my church coordinates with others.  Are Salvation Army partnered?”  Lieutenant Jason responded, “Salvation Army uses the state’s system (TEFAP).  It limits use to once monthly.  Other pantries cover individuals other times.  The overlap of charity programs is needed and appreciated.”
Kiwanian Maury Frey asked, “How do clothes arrive?”  “They generally come from Rockford.”
Kiwanis member Gregg Dickinson asked, “Guidestar only lists one Salvation Army tax ID number.  How does it go to Janesville?”  Lieutenant Jason responded, “Please write a check or use the barcode for Janesville.”
Lieutenant Jason’s presentation was well received and appreciated.

April Wright thanked Lt. Jason for speaking and presented him with a Kiwanis Parker pen.

Roger Willeford adjourned the meeting with a ring of the bell at 10:45AM.

On this day:
1690 The musical instrument, the clarinet, is invented in Nuremberg, Germany
1784 US Congress of the Confederation ratifies the Treaty of Paris, signed on September 3, 1783, ending the American Revolutionary War, and forwards it to the British government
1794 Dr. Jesse Bennett performs the first successful cesarean section in the United States on his wife, Elizabeth, delivering a baby girl at their home in Edom, Virginia
1813 Gideon Hawley becomes the first state school superintendent in the United States (New York)
1873 “Celluloid” registered as a trademark by its inventor John Wesley Hyatt
1911 Roald Amundsen’s South Pole expedition lands on the Ross Ice Shelf
1954 Baseball player Joe DiMaggio and actress Marilyn Monroe married at City Hall in San Francisco.
1960 US Army promotes Elvis Presley to Sergeant
1967 Sonny & Cher release single “The Beat Goes On”
1968 Super Bowl II, Miami Orange Bowl, Miami, FL: Green Bay Packers beat Oakland Raiders, 33-14; MVP: Bart Starr, Green Bay, QB
1969 Soyuz 4 launched; rendezvous with Soyuz 5 two days later
1973 “Aloha from Hawaii via Satellite,” an Elvis Presley concert broadcast live to Asia and Oceania and on delay to Europe and the US, becomes the most-watched broadcast by an individual entertainer
1973 Dancer Roy Castle is measured at 1,440 taps/min on BBC TV
1977 “Fantasy Island” starring Ricardo Montalbán and Hervé Villechaize premieres on ABC TV
1979 US President Jimmy Carter proposes Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday be a federal holiday
1981 US Federal Communications Commission frees stations to air as many commercials an hour as they wish
1989 29-year-old French woman Marie Claude Adam gives birth to sextuplets in Paris
2005 The Huygens probe, developed by the European Space Agency and delivered by NASA’s Cassini orbiter, landed on Saturn’s largest moon, Titan. Cassini was the first spacecraft to orbit Saturn, and Huygens was the first spacecraft to land on any celestial body beyond Mars.
International Kite Day – International Kite Day started in India, where it takes place in the northwestern state of Gujarat, and is most widely celebrated in the city of Ahmedabad. The festival is known as Uttarayan in the Hindi language, and it is also called Makar Sakranti in parts of India. It celebrates the changing of the seasons from winter to summer, as well the upcoming harvest of winter crops. People come from countries all over the world to celebrate. The kites that are associated with the festival symbolize the spirit of gods awakening after their winter sleep.
Ratification Day – On January 14, 1784, the Confederation Congress—which was also still known as the Continental Congress—ratified the Treaty of Paris, the document that officially ended the American Revolutionary War and made the United States of America a sovereign nation. This historic event and its anniversary each year is known as Ratification Day. There was a long road between the ending of hostilities of the Revolutionary War and this moment, and the treaty still had to be approved in Paris following Ratification Day, but it was on this day that the United States Congress made the end of the war official.

Minutes by Ryan Lewis.
Credit: Dave Figi, photographs.

Note: Kiwanis and its members are not responsible for errors or omissions.  We are open to discussion if you would like to request an alteration.