President Mark Rogo welcomed everyone to the warm and friendly Westwood Village Rotary Club. 

Our esteemed Treasurer, Terry M. White, led us in our pledge with our Vice President, Dr. Colby Smith, providing the invocation today.

No song today - we clearly are missing Dr. Paul "Frankie" Aslan!

Health and welfare:  An update on Dan Price and President Mark is trying to visit Andy Anderson in the next couple of days.  Good news - John O'Keefe is on the mend and doing well!  Even PDG Bill Goodwyn was in attendance today without glasses after cataract surgery looking good!

Visiting Rotarian, Assistant Governor Linton Morgan from Inglewood Rotary Club, was introduced.Mark Rogo introduced special guest, Zachary Brandler, from his Coldwell Banker office and of course the lovely Karen Ayers. Phil Gabriel introduced his special guest, Ron Zeidler,  a dentist in Century City who also happens to be a distinguished alum of University High ;)  Jim Collins had his youngest son, Mike Collins, joining him again today and Marsha Hunt introduced her guest, Lisa Deaton. And our speaker Dr. Matt Malkan and Emilien Chatelier, from his Department.

In addition to embarrassing Jim Collins by calling him aka Superman as he and Mike strolled in, our lovely Secretary Ann Samson announced on Sept 8 at 3:00p.m. the Westside Family YMCA and Stroh family will celebrate Lewis "Lou" Stroh's life at the Freud Playhouse on UCLA Campus 245 Charles E. Young Drive, LA, CA 90095  Parking is available in parking structure #3 for 12  Family has requested donations in memory of Lew be directed to the "Westside Family YMCA"  Your written memories are welcome in the memory box for the Stroh Family on the day of the service.

Mark will be going to Palo Alto to visit his beautiful grand daughter, Kira.  He committed while there to attend the Palo Alto University Rotary Club where they commit to having a woman President every other year.  He then showed the membership some Slides of Phil Gabriel and Aly Shoji.  Did you know Phil was a model in the 80's and on billboards all over LA?  We had proof!  And someone thinks Aly Shoji's Doppelganger is this CNBC anchor lol

Asst Gov, Linton Morgan, asked "Who is our Membership Chair?"  Tom Barron "And who is on the committee?"  Everyone!  And made a pitch for membership.

Past President Dwight Heikkila shared Reading to Kids is in need of 90 more readers for Sept 14.

Today's program was Dr. Matt Malkan, astrophysicist, and UCLA Professor of Astronomy.  He discussed, "Origins, the Grand Philosophical Question"

How did the Universe happen?  5 step answer: 

This answer was only accepted about 200 years ago by a renowned astronomer using elementary techniques.  Special tools were used to measure the rate at which the universe is expanding, and by reversing the speed, a theory was developed that the universe began about 13.7 billion years ago.  However, professor Malkan is still unsettled and admitted his unease at accepting a theory that left so  many open answers, such as what triggered the initial cosmic explosion and at what point will the expansion end?  This led many to surmise religious answers to scientific theories, still leaving questions open for interpretation today. 

On a different note, Chris Gaynor's senior craft talk will be posted in our archives once our Webmaster PP Ron Lyster returns from his trip. If you missed the meeting. I went on vacation and apologize for the delayed publishing as his craft talk was one of my favorite programs!  

Hope everyone had a great summer.