[John Petrella]: Hello, everyone, and welcome to Medford Happenings, a show foreign about the city of Medford. I am John Petrella, and the purpose of this program is to give Medford citizens facts and information to help you make informed choices. And today, we want to welcome our guest, Mr. Doug Shoup, who is a three-time president of the Medford Rotary Club. Doug, welcome to Medford Happenings.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thanks for having me.
[John Petrella]: It's our pleasure. All right, so let's begin by telling our audience a little bit about yourself. Who's Doug Shoup?
[SPEAKER_01]: OK, well, I'm originally from Ohio. And I came out here after I graduated architecture school at Cincinnati in 1985. So I've been here more than half my life. So this is my home. I still have relatives there, friends, and I do visit occasionally. I made a life for myself out here. I ended up about 31 years ago, opened my own architecture practice in Medford Square, and I've been there ever since. I'm right across the street from Colleen's, which was one of my first projects that I had. Oh, really?
[Unidentified]: Colleen's?
[SPEAKER_01]: I had no idea. Back when Colleen was alive, I did that for her. I'd go in and I'd say, hey, you need this redone. And eventually, I did it. And that was one of the first jobs I did. Nice. But and I got I immediately got involved in the Chamber of Commerce. Right. And they quickly elevated me to president for two years at the chamber. It's yeah. They're all thankless jobs. Right. Yeah.
[John Petrella]: No, we know that. Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: But so I did that, and I met a lot of really nice people there. And then I met a guy, Richard Wolfson, and he says, hey, I need to get you into Rotary. Like, I could tell you're going to do stuff, right? So he got me into Rotary. And shortly, maybe three years into Rotary, they asked me to be president. you know, a few times, a few years past, and it's hard to find people to volunteer, you know, a lot more time. But, you know, it's a very rewarding, it's a very rewarding thing. And I've always felt, and I was raised, you know, I'm a Midwesterner, so I was raised You know, you give back to the community you live in.
[John Petrella]: Absolutely. That's a great thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. And, you know, it's a lot of time and effort. But, you know, for me, it makes me feel good. It's worthwhile. And you know, you're helping people that a lot of people really need it. Yep. Yep. So. So I got in Rotary and, you know, bring me up to today. I've just been doing my little architecture thing in the square and back down to just myself. I had five people at one time.
[John Petrella]: Right.
[SPEAKER_01]: And really busy this year. So all of that's good, you know. Sounds good. Living a happy life.
[John Petrella]: That's all that matters. That's all that matters. All right. So there's a lot of people. I mean, I know a little bit about the Rotary, but there's a lot of people don't, you know, really know much about the Rotary. Can you tell us, you know, what it is, what you do?
[SPEAKER_01]: Absolutely. So the Rotary Club, Rotary International, it's an international organization. was founded 110 years ago by a man named Paul Harris. And he really started in Chicago. He started with, I don't know, four or five of his business friends, and they would get together and meet at each of their offices. They'd rotate every month, and they were trying to come up with the name of it, and they called it The Rotary because they rotated. And they were trying to raise money locally to help people that struggling businesses and struggling families out in a beneficial way, a benevolent way in Chicago. And now there's an award, a prestigious award, as a Rotarian you can get. It's called the Paul Harris Fellows Award. And I'm happy that I have a couple of those because of the time that I put in. But the club really There's 45,000 clubs across the globe. Wow. 1.2 million people are in Rotary. And you can go to their website, rotary.org, and you can see what they do. They help people out. The Rotary International, they primarily have helped eradicate polio across throughout the world. Wow. Because back in the late 50s when it was a vaccine was invented. A lot of, and I remember some people when I was a younger child that had polio, but it's eradicated in the United States, all pretty much, most countries other than third world countries have it completely eradicated. It's really hard to get the vaccine, but it's a little drop in a baby's mouth and they're vaccinated for life. That's one that's super successful. Polio is a terrible disease. Rotary International took that on, but that's nationally. So we, our club, every year gives a little bit of our money to the Rotary International fight against polio. Bill Gates has given hundreds of millions of dollars in matching grants. So if we raise $100, or if Rotary International raises it, he matches it, he doubles it with $200. It's very benevolent. But our club is one of many clubs in Massachusetts alone. And we have between 35 to 40 people in our club. We did it one time when I first joined 20-plus years ago. We had closer to 50. But as they've aged out and sort of got out of the club, It's very difficult to get younger people interested. But I think when they really see what we do, it's easy to get interested in Rotary. And when people say, well, what is Rotary? The easiest answer, other than all that stuff I just told you, is what do you guys do? Well, we raise a bunch of money, and then we give it away. And the important thing about a benevolent organization like Rotary and Aeronaut Club and all the other clubs is that no one's getting a salary, no one's getting paid, no one takes any profit. It all gets poured back in to our bank accounts that we have. We have multiple because certain accounts are for certain things that we do. But other than you think of all the charitable organizations that are known worldwide, American Cancer Society, There's a lot of people on the payroll. There's a big budget there. Our budget really is every month. I happen to be on the board of directors. And we review things, benevolent requests, and then we approve them. But we have to raise money for that.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, at the end of the day, we're helping people more locally in our community. Some Rotary clubs really like to team up with clubs across the globe and help build things and water and cleaning, clean water where people don't have them. So it's really, you know, for me, you know, you know, you're helping people and you don't always see the face. Every once in a while, you'll be on the street or you'll be at an event and let's say, hey, you did this for that person. I know you're in Rotary and it really helped them. We're not making big money here, but it's helpful.
[John Petrella]: Let me ask you, core values. What are the core values?
[SPEAKER_01]: Rotary's motto is service above self. It's really simple. You have to be selfless to serve others. Correct. I'll read it because I should know this by heart, but I don't. Rotary International has what's called a four-way test. And in the climate we live in today, this should be a test that's required by every one of our leaders, people in public office. And the test is, is it the truth, number one? Number two, is it fair for all concerned? Number three, will it build goodwill and better friendships? And number four, will it be beneficial to all concerned? It's really a simple motto, really. But it's excellent. And I joke sometimes when you're out and you're at some place and you're grabbing dishes and you're putting them away for Thanksgiving and like, that's really nice, I serve as above self. I mean, it's family, but it's the same core value. I always feel like if everyone had those core values, we wouldn't have wars, we wouldn't have all of this stuff, hate.
[John Petrella]: You know, but we need to spread that around.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're not. I hear you.
[John Petrella]: No, I hear you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[John Petrella]: Yeah. 100 percent. Right. It'd be nice to spread that around. Next question, really, I mean, are you guys. The Rotary, are you associated politically, religious, nothing?
[SPEAKER_01]: Not at all, not at all. We've had council people on our city councilors as Rotarians. The last one was Stephanie Muccini-Burke. She was on Rotary and very involved. Good person, Stephanie. I know Paul Donato is involved in the Kiwanis, Rick Caraviello in the Kiwanis. So they're also not politically aligned with anything. Rarely do we have politicians come and speak. We usually have organizations come to our luncheons and speak.
[John Petrella]: It's nice to know.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[John Petrella]: So you touched on this a little bit. I'm always curious. I think you mentioned, but how did you become involved with the Rotary?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, as I said, I was asked to come in and that's usually how you get in. But you know what? People show up at our, we meet twice a month. at Bertucci's, as long as they're there. But we, I know it's- Not going to be the- Who knows? Yeah, I know. We thought they were going to be gone a while ago, but they're still there. They're still there. And it's a perfect spot for us because it's kind of centrally located, it's easy to get to. But we meet the first Thursday of the month for lunch, and the third Wednesday For dinner.
[John Petrella]: Oh, that's nice.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so that way it allows our members to have a cheese I can't make it for lunch, you know, sometimes they just can't do lunches, but I can do dinner at 6 o'clock, right? So All that stuff's on the website You can find out what you know, when would type what time we're meeting sometimes we like like around Christmas. We don't meet, you know, but But I can talk about the fundraisers. Okay, so
[John Petrella]: Obviously everyone is welcome to join right and then you know, I always are there any I do you look for You know skills or talents In a member like is there anything I
[SPEAKER_01]: No, not really. I mean, it sounds a little odd, but the thing is, most of the people in our club work for businesses in Medford. Some work outside of Medford, because maybe they move jobs, but they keep coming back to, they stay in our club. Some of them go to other clubs, like if they move to Wakefield, they might go to the Wakefield Rotary and join that, but they've established, friendships and everything else with the people. And I just love the people in the club. They're just, they all have their mind, you know, the same heart, you know, the mindset is the same. But we welcome anyone. I mean, it's hard to find young kids because they're so busy. I mean, everyone's busy, right? But they have so many things going on that it's hard for them to take time away if they're starting a new job. But I would love to have more younger people in the club. And it's just kind of the nature of clubs like ours. It's happening everywhere. But as long as you're 18, or out of high school, you can join our club. Now, we did have a rotary club in the high school, Medford High, right here.
[John Petrella]: I remember.
[SPEAKER_01]: It was called the Interact Club. And we co-sponsored them for some of their events. They were very active. Right. And they would come to our club whenever they had off school. If they were around, they could come to one of our luncheons and stuff. But we do get people. randomly, I check the email, the rotary email, and they'll say, hey, I'm from New Zealand, and we're going to be in Medford because our daughter and son-in-law live there. Can we come to a meeting? And I'm like, absolutely. If you come to a meeting, will feed you. It's basically a free meal. And then you can meet the people. And a lot of times they'll come back if they revisit. But there are people that join every year. We do have some members that, I'm moving to Florida because I'm retiring or something. But we sort of stay in that same range of amount of people. But all we really look for is people that really are interested in helping out. Don't just be a Rotarian because it looks good on your resume. It's not one of those clubs. This is a benevolent club. We're here to help people. We're all volunteer. Everyone's a volunteer. It's a good core group of people that are always stepping up to the plate.
[John Petrella]: It's nice for me to hear and for a lot of other people to hear that all the money goes where it's supposed to go. I mean, that's huge. I mean, let's be honest, you don't see that as much anymore, put it that way.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, trust me.
[John Petrella]: I know, I've seen.
[SPEAKER_01]: Trust me, our treasurer holds it tight, and once it's approved, but we have checks and balances built into our board. We approve things. And a lot of them are repeat donations, helping a number of charities throughout the city of Medford. Our club is really, we like to keep it all in Medford. Sometimes we'll team up with the Somerville or a Winchester or something like that, but for the most part, it stays, the money that we raise, it stays here.
[John Petrella]: It stays in Medford, well that's nice to know. So, here's a good question, how do you guys, You know, the Rotary go about raising funds and then, you know, there's got to be membership fees, I assume.
[SPEAKER_01]: There is membership fees. I want to say the membership fees, including lunches and dinners, run close to, well, The dinners are like twenty dollars a meal or something. Yeah. But it's every other week. So it's two times a month. You can do the math. Rotary International dues aren't that much there. I think there's seventy five dollars a quarter. So say three hundred dollars a year per member. Yeah. And then and then you know we're on our club is on the map. You know the big rotary website.
[John Petrella]: Right.
[SPEAKER_01]: As once you're a member you know they keep track of how long you've been a member and all that stuff. And if you're if you're still a member then our club gets billed, and then we pay them. But our treasurer, trust me, he's out there with the invoices, and he collects that, and he pays for all that. And we go through the accounts, the ledger all the time. But we raise money by having events. And coincidentally, a week from, well, next Wednesday, we're having comedy night. which is one of our fundraisers we do every year. And there was a lot of people like, we don't want to watch the same comedians. And we're having it at Giggles, which is at Prince Pizza on Route 1. And I was one of them. I'm like, I don't want that comedian because we've seen him. But this year, we're going to get a new group of comedians. The cost is $40. And if you do it online, it's $42. I think you pay the service fee or or whatever it is, Eventbrite or whatever that is. But you can do PayPal or Venmo. So it's 42 bucks and you get all the pizza you can eat, all the soda you can drink. And if you wanna drink, that's on you. But it's a good night. We get three comedians and it's a good social night and it's a lot of fun. And I brought people from some of my clients in the past and even some of the kids in the office and they've enjoyed themselves. So that's next Wednesday, the 26th. OK. And but our other fundraisers we had in last spring and we're probably going to do it again is the is a meat raffle. And now it sounds a little weird. I know. Right. And one of the women in our club and she came up with the idea and it was it was a great success. I think we raised three or four thousand dollars. No kidding. By selling basically chances for to win like $500 or $1,000 a meter or whatever it was. I don't remember the exact details. And it's all from, I don't know if it's, not Bob's, but Dom's. Dom's, okay, yeah. Like Dom's, but the prices of that's gone up, so we're sort of evaluating how we're gonna structure that. And that was just new last year. But probably one of our bigger things is the Super Bowl squares raffle.
[John Petrella]: Yeah, that's always big. Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right. So I will tell you this. When Tom Brady was here selling the tickets, they sold out very quickly.
[John Petrella]: Right.
[SPEAKER_01]: But this and I basically run that because I have I'm like Mr. Spreadsheet guy. And and yeah, so I have it all down to a system. And I just everyone knows and that pretty much the same people sell the same amount of tickets every year. And we always sell out. So that's that is basically to a And we give half of that away. So every quarter is, what, $1,250. So you divide the $5,000, so we get $5,000. And it's very low lifting. So after January, and I know who the final playoffs, I start, hey, where are we going? We got the Super Bowl squares. And anyone, if you know a Rotarian and want to go and you want to get a square, I'm telling you, they're very, I never realized, I never did when I was younger, how popular they
[John Petrella]: Oh, yeah, they are. A lot of people will play them. It's crazy. Yeah, no, I know.
[SPEAKER_01]: And they're like, hey, Doug, do another one, because we sold out. And I'm like, no, if you want to do one, you can do it. It's the Super Bowl. Everyone wants to be involved. Yeah, well, like I said, when Brady was raking them in, it was easy. But even last year, we sold out a week in advance. But everyone wastes, it's like anything else. Everyone wastes the last minute to do, to shell out the $100. But it's fun, you know, it's a good thing.
[John Petrella]: Well you guys are creative in your fundraising, so I like that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And in the past we had a casino night which was spectacular. We made a lot of money that went directly into our bank. And we were able to, I think we, when the new library opened, we donated $10,000 to the fund. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, it's $25,000. And to the library, I think it was maybe a little placard in there or something with our name on it in that list. in the Bloomberg Library, but we don't do that that often because that's a lot of fundraisers. When we had the casino night up in Melrose Center, we We did very well, and it was a lot of fun. But you know, so these fundraisers run their course. Super Bowl squares never run in their course. But the meat raffle might last another year or two, and then we'll have to come up with another way. But basically, we raise that money, and then we give it away. We kind of break even at the end of the year. Sometimes if we have a little left over, we throw it into what our biggest giveaway is. is the holiday food baskets.
[John Petrella]: Okay, yeah, I know about those.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right, so, not last year, year before last, I just happened to be on one of the Medford websites, and I saw that the city was giving out $10,000 grant money. So that year, we applied for it, we got it, we totally qualified for it because it was going directly to the food basket program. Every year that I've been involved in Rotary, we've done 200 or more. That year we did 250. And basically what it is, we used to pack the boxes, and I don't know if you have some of the photos that I sent, but there's basically, we work with the high school kids, they collect, the high school vocational school, they collect canned goods. They used to. And then COVID hit. So now what do we do? So we changed course, and it's less, like I said, it's less lifting for the high school kids, although they loved doing it. All the Rotarians, we'd go and we'd pack, and every one of those boxes was filled with a turkey, and basically a big Thanksgiving dinner for about eight people. And it was great because you're lugging these things in, and so many people appreciated those. Now, It's a gift card from Wegmans.
[John Petrella]: Oh, that's fine.
[SPEAKER_01]: So we work with Wegmans on a grocery list, which is the same that we used to put in. And last year, I think it was $60 or $65 card. You don't think it's that much, but if you go in with that list, you can buy all of the Wegmans stuff and pack. So now we give out the gift cards. And some people may not want, we don't want the wafers or whatever, and they can do what they want with it.
[John Petrella]: I'm going to tell you right now, right? I know all the things you're talking about. I know of a couple of them. Sure. OK? But it's so good to have you on the show so people understand. Yeah. Because there's so much good going on in Medford.
[SPEAKER_01]: Absolutely.
[John Petrella]: And you know, it's just nice. It's nice to hear about it. It's nice to know what you do. You know, I always now, correct me if I'm wrong, you guys always had a scholarship fund.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because I do remember that I'm glad you brought that up. Yeah, we give away Scholarships to graduating high school seniors that live in Medford. They don't have to go to Medford High They can go to a vocational school someone we have we've had some four-minute man, right? We've had some from you know other high schools in the surrounding area, you know parochial high schools, whatever and Matignon, you know some of those other schools and as long as they live in Medford and are graduating senior they can apply for the scholarship. Now the scholarship in about two or three months before they're ready to graduate we post on our website and we tell the the guidance department here at the school and all of the schools are aware that If you have any kids from Medford, they should apply. And there's requirements, right? Academic, there's volunteer requirements, and you know, you have to, and there's, we gave away last year $12,000 or $13,000. So, and you know, I mean, it's not much these days, but it's $2,000 per kid.
[John Petrella]: It helps. A couple thousand dollars is probably your books.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, but still, it's off their backs.
[John Petrella]: Every little bit helps.
[SPEAKER_01]: Every little bit helps. And sometimes you just think like, why aren't more of these kids applying? And last year we had quite a few. And every year we have a scholarship dinner, which is usually in June, right around that they may have just ready to technically graduate, but they're out of school. And we invite the parents so they can come and we present them with the check. And we have it over at, we've been having it at Avellino's in their little function area.
[John Petrella]: Right, Avellino's in that function room, yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I tell you, last year the kids were phenomenal. Like, whoa. Good. Two girls that were twins graduated from Medford and top two in the class. And one was going to Harvard and one was going to Yale, or they were both going to Harvard. I mean, their qualifications were insane. And I'm like, how do you, it's just, it wasn't because, they just were involved in everything. It wasn't just, okay, I got good grades, hand me the money. No, you have to be doing a little bit more than that. And they were doing above and beyond what I ever would have imagined at that age when I was younger.
[John Petrella]: I'm glad we're doing the show, because I tell you, the word gets out, a lot of people, Yeah. They're going to be learning a lot about the rotary.
[SPEAKER_01]: Look at it. Look on the website, medfordrotaryclub.org or something like that. Look on the website in the spring. And then Ed and myself will post. There'll be a form you can just download PDF. But they should be able to get it from also the guidance department because we let them know.
[John Petrella]: We'll get the website up on the screen. So do you have a, I'm sorry.
[SPEAKER_01]: I just want to add one. We do have. Here's the hardest scholarship to give away. Several years ago, we had a Rotarian. His name was Ed Jaskalian. He was a Rotarian forever. And I only had 40 or 50 years in Rotary. He passed away and he left a scholarship of twenty five, twenty five thousand dollars to give out. You know, not all of it at once, but to use. So what we do is we have that like a fund in the the the interest that spun off of it. We give scholarships away. but that's for someone that's going into a vocational school. And I think today you see more kids doing that, whether they want to be an electrician or work in a machine shop or something, and they're in some sort of a program, they can apply for that scholarship. And we've had several years where no one applies for it because it's tricky. But I think that this year we had several apply, which is encouraging because You don't have to, not everyone wants to go to college. Not everyone has to go to college. You can be just as successful without it.
[John Petrella]: But that's nice to have that. Once the word gets out, you know, I think people, you'll get more applications.
[SPEAKER_01]: I hope so.
[John Petrella]: Yeah, you will. Because I've never heard of that. And I'm just, you know, I know a lot about what's going on in Method, but I've never ever heard of that. I'm learning a lot today. I'm so glad you come on Doug. So, you know, this will be, we'll finish up the show. Do you have a location in Method? I mean, we'll put up your website and everything else, but is there a location?
[SPEAKER_01]: will you know, on on a regular basis. And and they're all from all different. We have attorneys. We have dentists. We've got the only architect. So, you know, but a lot of a lot of people from financial people. and they're just good people. And we have fun, we use a lot of laughs, and we do a little business for the meeting, talk about what functions we're doing. I mean, really one of my favorite things that we do is we give dictionaries, and that's gonna be happening in the next month. We give dictionaries to every third grader in Medford, parochial and high school. So we, at the beginning of the year, they give us the numbers, and then we, this year I think it's like 450 dictionaries we order, and they get a little bookmark in there, and then we take them out and we give them, and the kids are just, they just like, they don't get to keep the books. These books, they keep them forever. My favorite, my favorite tail end of that is, I was doing one of the things over at McGlynn years ago, and a girl came in and she says, she was out of high school, and she says, I'm in college. And I still use that dictionary I got in third grade. It's rare today, because everyone's got their cell phones, right? But the kids, they love it, because they got something physical they can take home, and it's their own. They put their name in it. They write their name in it. It's very cool. That's very nice. And the kids love it. It's so much fun.
[John Petrella]: Well, you know, thank you for coming on the show. My pleasure. Honestly, I learned a lot, and I'm sure the audience is going to learn a lot.
[SPEAKER_02]: I hope so.
[John Petrella]: Really, thank you so much. So, we are getting near the end, so I just want to thank our guest, Doug Shoup, for introducing our audience to the Method Rotary Club. That was, you did a great job, great job, great job.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I've never lost for words. Yeah. I think most people.
[John Petrella]: No, no, but great job. And then, you know, telling us about the outstanding work it does in the community. I also want to take a minute to thank everyone. who has been watching the show, and thank you for the feedback. You know, we take it whether it's positive or negative, it's been great because it's been mostly positive. So if you would like to share a comment, opening a new business, you know, you have an existing business, you represent an organization such as Doug, you have any upcoming events, Anyone wants to appear on the future show, please contact us at method happenings. Oh Two one five five at gmail.com and you will be able to see replays of this show on method community media Monday Wednesdays Fridays at 6 or 7 p.m. Eastern and on our really, I'm talking, fantastic website, methodhappenings.com. And you'll also find us on YouTube and on Facebook at Method Happenings. So for the Method Happenings team, Paul, Marco, Bruce, Margaret, and James, I'm John Petrella. And please remember, stay informed. Thank you, everyone. Great show. Ta-da!