Capital Rotary Club

Our speaker at our meeting Wednesday, February 10th was Mr. John Sherrer and the general topics will be, “Remembering Columbia”.  John currently serves as the Director of Cultural Resources for the Historic Columbia Foundation.  Originally hailing from Columbia, John received both Bachelors and Masters degrees from Clemson University and a second Masters degree from the University of South Carolina.   John has published three books:

1. Fancy and Fine, Plain and Simple: Furniture in Columbia and Richland County, South Carolina, 1800-1860 in 2002;
2. The Governor’s Mansion of South Carolina, 1855-2001 in 2008;
3. Remembering Columbia in 2015

Our speaker at Wednesday’s meeting was Mr. Curtis Loftis, State Treasurer for South Carolina.

Referencing the Treasurer website: Curtis M. Loftis, Jr. is the state’s “private banker,” managing and investing the state’s funds. He is the custodian of more than $43 billion in State funds, including the state’s pension funds. He serves as Vice Chairman of the State Fiscal Accountability Authority, an executive body that provides oversight to such statewide policy matters as property, procurement and debt. He is the Chairman of the Board of Financial Institutions, which supervises state chartered financial institutions and supervises mortgage originators and lenders, finance companies, payday lenders, and title lenders, and is a member of the South Carolina Retirement System Investment Commission which manages the $30 billion retirement fund’s investments.

Mr. Loftis was elected State Treasurer in 2010 — winning all 46 counties in his first bid for public office — and was re-elected in 2014. Mr. Loftis owns several businesses and is the founder and sole benefactor of the Saluda Charitable Foundation, a charity that operates in Ukraine, Bolivia and Haiti. He is a resident of West Columbia, SC and is a 1981 graduate of the University of South Carolina.

http://www.treasurer.sc.gov/treasurers-office/meet-the-treasurer

Our speaker on Wednesday morning, December 16^th was USC’s First Lady Patricia Moore-Pastides.  In addition to being the University of South Carolina’s first lady, Patricia Moore-Pastides is an accomplished cook, successful public health professional, advocate for many worthy causes and author of two Greek cookbooks. Moore-Pastides received a sociology degree from the College of the Holy Cross and a Master in Public Health from Yale University School of Medicine and is a graduate from the University of North Carolina’s Management Academy for Public Health.

Our speaker on Wednesday morning, November 18h was Mr. Bill Davies, Jr.  Mr. Davies, Jr., formally a partner of Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough LLP for 34 years, practiced law in Columbia, South Carolina in the areas of general litigation, general product liability, toxic torts and mass tort litigation. He has been retired since January 1, 2010. Active in community affairs, Mr. Davies served on the board of directors of the Family Service Center, the Harvest Hope Food Bank, and the United Way of the Midlands. Mr. Davies also served on the Citadel Class of 1964 50th Reunion Capital Campaign Committee.  He has been active in local Episcopal churches including St Martin’s in the Fields for 19 years and Trinity Episcopal Cathedral since 1992. He is a member of the Edisto Island Historic Preservation Society, the South Carolina Archives & History Foundation,  the South Carolina Historical Society, the Charleston Museum, the South Carolina State Museum, the Sons of the American Revolution, the Old Edgefield District Genealogical Society, the Sons of Confederate Veterans, the Civil War Trust, the Blue and Gray Educational Society, the South Carolina Confederate Relic Room and Military History Museum, the Military Order of the Stars and Bars and the South Carolina Battleground Preservation Trust.  Bill’s remarks on Wednesday will pertain to all things Robert Mills.

Prior to joining Nelson Mullins, Mr. Davies was a captain in the Judge Advocate General’s Corps of the U.S. Army serving on active duty for over 5 years with duty stations at Ft. Lewis, Washington as well as Frankfurt, Germany and Vicenza, Italy.   Bill earned a Juris Doctor from the University Of South Carolina School Of Law in 1967. In 1964, Mr. Davies earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from The Citadel.   Mr. Davies was born and had his basic education in Greenwood, South Carolina, while spending all of his summers at Edisto Beach, South Carolina. He has been happily married to the former Mahalie King Brown of Anderson, South Carolina since 1966. They have three children and nine grandchildren.

Our speaker on Wednesday morning, November 4th was Ms. Erin Galloway Hall, Director of the Palmetto Place Children’s Shelter. Prior to joining the Children’s Shelter, Erin was the Executive Director for the Midlands-area March of Dimes from 2009-2011 and Director of Marketing & Communications for the National Association of Campus Activities between 2004 and 2009. Erin earned her Bachelor’s degree in Journalism from the University of South Carolina.