The Spring Plant Sale is happening now
Rotary meets the 1st and 3rd Wednesday of each month at noon in the Otterbein Town Hall / Community Center.
Otterbein Town Hall / Community Center
111 S Main St, Otterbein, IN 47970
Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library is in Benton County!
That’s right, all preschool children (birth until their fifth birthday) living in Benton County are eligible to participate. There is no cost to you thanks to the Benton County Imagination Library, the Benton Community Foundation and the many organizations, businesses and individuals who support this excellent program.
Each month a new carefully selected book will be mailed to your child’s name, directly to your home. They can look forward to new and exciting reading adventures from Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library until they turn five years old, as long as you remain a resident of Benton County.
Register your child today by calling (765) 583-2107 for more information, or you can visit your nearest public library in Benton County to get a registration brochure.
The Otterbein Rotary Club is proud to be an annual sponsor of this excellent program to benefit the pre-school age children of Benton County.
The Rotary Four-Way Test
One of the most widely printed and quoted statements of business ethics in the world is the Rotary International 4-Way Test. It was created by Rotarian Herbert J. Taylor in 1932 when he was asked to take charge of a company that was facing bankruptcy. Taylor looked for a way to save the struggling company mired in depression caused financial difficulties. He drew up a 24 word code of ethics for all employees to follow in their business and professional lives. The 4-Way Test became the guide for sales, production, advertising and all relations with dealers and customers, and the survival of the company is credited to this simple philosophy.
Herb Taylor became president of Rotary International in 1954-55. The 4-Way Test was adopted by Rotary in 1943 and has been translated into more than a hundred languages and published in thousands of ways.
THE FOUR- WAY TEST
Of the things we think, say or do:
- Is it the TRUTH?
- Is it FAIR to all concerned?
- Will it build GOODWILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS?
- Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned?
Community Service Projects & Activities
Each year the Otterbein Rotary awards scholarships to 3 or 4 local graduating seniors from Benton Central. This year’s recipients were Grace Adams, Tad Foster, Annie Pruitt, and Evan Mak Hoffman.
Bob Feemster presented the scholarships to Grace and Tad during a Rotary meeting this summer.
In 2017, the Otterbein Rotary purchased three Little Free Libraries and placed them around the community – Ron Thompson Park, Fellure’s Grocery Store, and the town of Greenhill.
In 2020 the libraries were spruced up by Rotarians Dave Buck, Al Hefner, Nancy Lee, and Bob Feemster.
With COVID-19 affecting the lives of everyone in our small community, the three Benton County Rotary Clubs (Boswell, Fowler, & Otterbein) worked together to obtain a $5,000 grant from the Benton Community Foundation.
With Otterbein Rotary’s portion of the money we donated “Food Vouchers” to the Benton County Food Coop in Oxford to be distributed to families needing groceries and gasoline to be purchased at Fellure’s Grocery Store.
The club also collected food at Fellure’s to donate to the Benton County Food Coop.
The club also donated Food Vouchers to Otterbein Elementary School’s “Backpack Program”. The backpacks, filled with food items and vouchers, are sent home each Friday to families dealing with food insecurity.
Benton County Retirement Village
The Otterbein Rotary Club applied for and received a grant through the Benton Community Foundation in the amount of $1,000 to purchase social enrichment activities for the 13 residents of the Benton County Retirement Village. Purchases included Bean Bag Toss, life-size checkers and tic-tac-toe, life-size dice games, jumbo 4 in a row, horseshoes, and two Wii gaming systems with an assortment of games including bowling, fishing, etc.
Pickleball Courts – Several Rotary Club members – including our president-elect, play pickleball and suggested creating a court right here in our town of Otterbein. With the blessing of the town, we hired an individual to paint the pickleball court lines on two tennis courts in the town park. We then purchased pickleball equipment as well as tennis equipment for anyone to check out from the Otterbein Town Library
A group from Otterbein traveled to Honduras over the Christmas break to build a home for a mother and her five children. Otterbein Rotary covered the cost of a new cook stove for a family in Honduras