Rotary News__________________________

Dayton Rotary announces Ambassadorial Scholarship

The Rotary Club of Dayton is now accepting applications for the Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarship.  The scholarship is for foreign study during academic year 2009-2010.  Up to $25,000 will be provided for round-trip transportation, tuition and fees, room, board, some education supplies, and language training (if necessary).  Scholars act as “ambassadors of goodwill” as they study abroad in one of more than 160 countries where Rotary Clubs are located.

Students with permanent addresses in the Dayton area, or studying in the area, who have completed two years of college or two years of recognized vocational work by the time the scholarship period begins are eligible to apply.  Graduate students may apply as well.  The application deadline is March 3, 2008.

Since 1947 more than 30,000 men and women from 100 nations have studied abroad under the auspices of Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarships. Today it is the world’s largest privately funded international scholarships program. More than 1,100 scholarships were awarded for study in 2007-08. Through grants totaling approximately $26 million, recipients from some 69 countries studied in more than 64 nations.

Contact Diane Welborn at (937) 223-4613, to request an application form.

Recycling initiative by Oakwood Rotary
beginning Saturday, Feb. 2

The Oakwood Rotary Club, in cooperation with the city of Oakwood, is pleased to announce a new Community Recycling initiative.

Beginning Saturday, Feb. 2, members of the Oakwood Rotary Club will collect unwanted household waste items that are not permitted to be included in the regular weekly city trash pickup.

Items include: Paints, Stains, Thinners, Pesticides and Batteries (All materials must be in sealed containers)

This program will take place once per calendar quarter beginning with Zone 1.

Future collection dates are:

April 26 - Zone 2
July 26 - Zone 3
October 25 - Zone 4

Zones are defined consistent with the city’s weekly garbage pickup days:

Zone 1 is Monday’s trash route
Zone 2 is Tuesday’s route
Zone 3 is Wednesday’s route
Zone 4 is Thursday’s route

Please call 296-5155 and leave your name and address and the items will be collected between 9-noon on the designated Saturday. Although there is no charge for this volunteer service, citizens wishing to make a tax-deductible donation to the Oakwood Rotary Club Foundation (IRS 501 c3) may do so at the time of pickup or by mail to Oakwood Rotary Club, PO Box 512, Dayton, Ohio 45409.

Questions concerning this program can also be left at phone number 296-5155.

Centennial Reflections
Essays from the Oakwood Historical Society

The Longs and the Shroyers - a family history
By Harry G. Ebeling

Since this series is aimed at those who may not know or who have forgotten the roots of Oakwood history, let’s take the time to look at two families that are responsible for about half of Oakwood – the Longs and the Shroyers.

Peter Long came here from Maryland in 1828 and purchased a quarter section in what is now Kettering in the Southern Boulevard area. His home on Laureldale Rd. is on the National Register of Historic Places. One of his thirteen children (by four wives) was Henry Long who purchased a quarter section in the south west corner of what is now Oakwood in 1856. He built a log cabin on what is now Park Rd. and began to clear it. By 1863 he was able to build a house for his growing family, which is the basic Long-Romspert Homestead of the Oakwood Historical Society, also on the National Register.

It is important to know that this house us still there, hiding under the 1920 stucco exterior. It is always surprising when we take people through, that this isn’t known. The land, as we discovered in the initial articles of this series, wasn’t suitable for farming as he had hoped, but it contained a substantial amount of gravel from the glacier. He was able to plant a few orchard trees, but it turned out to be a fairly successful gravel quarry. He sold two tracts off and by the time of his death in 1896 there remained 101.5 acres of the original 160.

The Shroyer brothers, John and Jacob, came here from Maryland in 1819 and bought half sections, returning to get their father and bring him here before settling down. John’s first purchase proved to be unwise, for the same reason Henry Long’s purchase wasn’t. It was in the Hills & Dales area off what is now West Schantz, and wasn’t tillable.

A few years later he cut his losses and bought the Section which was opposite Henry Long’s which is what is now in Oakwood – from Far Hills Avenue to Shroyer Road, and from Peach Orchard Avenue to Lonsdale Avenue. He added 13.75 acres between Peach Orchard and Triangle Avenue, from Far Hills to Shroyer. All of this was good land, and by hard work he and his family cleared it and made a successful farm.

His farm house was at the corner of what is now Hadley Avenue and Far Hills. It was made from bricks baked in a kiln on the property.

This house was torn down in 1960 and an apartment was built, otherwise it would be the oldest house in Oakwood.

John later acquired the quarter section on the other side of Shroyer Road so that he had 410 acres at the time of his death. Now it gets interesting – the rest of the story. John’s daughter, Harrriet,  married Henry Long. After John died, his heirs got together in 1881 and guaranteed their mother a life income in return for a deed to the share of the property they would get at her death. Thus Harriet Shroyer Long got 102.5 acres. Her brother, Andrew, had no interest in farming, so he sold his 80.5 acres to Henry Long. Now Henry was in business with 284.5 acres of what is now south Oakwood! He farmed and sold gravel until his death in 1896.

When Henry and Harriet died in 1896, his heirs split up the acreage. Their daughter, Laura Long Romspert, who had had cared for the parents since her husband died in 1892, got the Homestead and 90 acres. That’s why it’s called the Long-Romspert homestead.

That’s where we begin to tell the story of the Homestead to school children and visitors. We point out that in 1863, there were no utilities, and cooking wasn’t done inside the house. So we have an authentic summer kitchen building in the back, complete with a large open fireplace and a bell to summon the farm workers from across the way on the former Shroyer farm. We point to a pump house where water was pumped to a trough for watering livestock. We show a picture of a large barn that stood in the parking area behind the house, where horses and feed were kept for farming and quarrying operations. We tell about the carriage house where a formal buggy was kept. We tell about the gardens where flowers and vegetables were grown and there was a grape arbor. It all spins into a story about another time, when life was simpler but a lot harder.      

It’s a hard sell to third and fourth graders, when we explain what a chamber pot is for, that there wasn’t always a street out front, that schools were over a mile away, and there was no television – but that’s the fun of it.

www.teamkooz.com