Many years ago – no one is really sure when it all began – the Sheridan Rotary Club started a program called “Happy Buck.” The purpose was to collect money at each meeting from members who were happy about something in their life since the last meeting. The thought was that a dollar would be just about the right amount and it was decided the money would be used to provide a monthly stipend to the club’s sponsored foreign exchange student. This was a fine idea and has since become an ingrained tradition.
Every year the club celebrates Happy Buck by awarding a plaque to the member who gave the most “happy” money for the preceding year. And over the years the idea of a single dollar has given away to several dollars that a member may give for several good things in their life since the previous meeting. Typically, members list birthdays, anniversaries, sports events, good weather, births, special honors and awards and just about anything else they can think of for being happy. Sometimes members donate a few bucks for no other reason than they are just happy.
For many years the Club’s Happy Buck coordinator was Roy Overdorf, but Roy passed away last year. His job has been taken over by his good friend and fellow Rotarian Steve Martin. The role of the coordinator, as defined by Martin, is to wheedle, cajole, coax, sweet-talk, entice and/or persuade club members in a humorous way to give a little bit more than originally intended. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t but it is always a fun activity at each of the meetings, and once a month the proceeds make Rotary’s foreign exchange student pretty happy, too.
The Sheridan Rotary Club honoree for the 2017 Happy Buck Award actually fell to two individuals: Steve Armfield and Fred Sturdevant. They tied in the amount they gave over the past year and are well-deserving of winning the award. Congratulations to both of them.
The Sheridan Rotary Club has formal meetings the first and third Tuesday evenings of each month at 6:15 p.m. at the Sheridan Public Library. The remaining Tuesday evenings are dedicated to various community work projects or club business meetings. If you would be interested in becoming more involved in the Sheridan community you ought to consider becoming a Sheridan Rotarian. They are very friendly people, they do good things for the community and they have a lot of fun along the way.