* Literacy Fundraiser *

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Interested in tickets for this year's event? Send an email to literacyluncheon@iiaweb.com.

• Recent Speakers • Distribution of Proceeds • Past Speakers List • Information for Speakers

 March 15, 2012, Literacy Lunch 
to feature Knoxville author

Knoxville author Pamela Schoenewaldt will be the featured speaker at the 19th annual literacy fundraiser sponsored by Oak Ridge Breakfast Rotary and Altrusa International of Oak Ridge.

This year's event is set for Thursday, March 15, 2012, at Oak Ridge High School. Reservations and corporate sponsorships will be handled by Patricia Vanek at 865-298-1241 or e-mail literacyluncheon@iiaweb.com.

Schoenewaldt lived for 10 years in a small town outside Naples, Italy. Her short stories have appeared in literary magazines in England, France, Italy and the United States.

Her play, “Espresso con mia Madre” (Espresso with my Mother) was performed at Teatro Cilea in Naples. She taught writing for the University of Maryland, European Division and the University of Tennessee.

She now lives in Knoxville with her husband, Maurizio Conti, a medical physicist, and their dog Jesse, a philosopher.

“If you leave Opi, you’ll die with strangers,” Irma Vitale’s mother always warned. But Irma is too poor and too plain to marry and can’t find honest work in her tiny mountain village in Southern Italy. Barely twenty, she must leave home bearing only native wit and astonishing skill with a needle. Risking rough passage across the Atlantic, a single woman in a strange land, Irma seeks a new life sewing dresses for gentlewomen.

Swept up in the crowded streets of nineteenth-century America, Irma finds workshop servitude and miserable wages, but also seeds of friendship in the raw immigrant quarters. When her determination leads at last to Chicago, Irma blossoms under the hand of an austere Alsatian dressmaker, sewing fabrics and patterns more beautiful than she’d ever imagined. Then this tenuous peace is shattered. From the rubble, confronting human cruelty and kindness, suffering and hope, a new Irma emerges, nurturing a talent she’d never imagined and an unlikely family, patched together by the common threads that unite us all.

When We Were Strangers was a Spring 2011 Selection for the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Program, a Book-of-the-Month Club and Doubleday Book Club alternate selection for January, 2011.

Interested in applying for funds raised as a result of this year's event?

BACKGROUND

Lack of literacy skills continues to be a serious problem in the lives of many of our East Tennessee neighbors and for many throughout the world. Non-readers and below-grade readers cannot realize their full potential in life, which in turn adversely affects our local and national economies and society in general.

To address the needs of this almost invisible group, the Oak Ridge Breakfast Rotary Club and Altrusa International of Oak Ridge co-sponsor an annual fundraiser to support organizations in Anderson and Roane counties that actively address illiteracy.

Thanks to the support of our sponsors and individuals in the community, we are able to make a difference in the lives of some of the 20 percent of Anderson and Roane county residents who are functionally illiterate.

Each year since the it began, under the auspices of Rotarian and author Frank Jamison, our fundraiser has featured someone who has enjoyed success as a literary figure (Roots author Alex Haley and novelist Diane Johnson), a media observer (Katy Smyser, a producer of NBC's Dateline), or other notable figure (U.S. Sen. Paul Simon, U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Haas). Folk singer Kate Campbell spoke (and sang) several years ago; and, in what was probably our most unusual year, we heard from two slam poets from California. (See a complete list of speakers, below.)

The event is usually held in the spring, but we try to find a great speaker and then work our schedules together.

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2008-2009 GRANTS Robertsville Middle School National Geographic "Reading Expeditions" paperback book series Greg Hamilton, Teacher ($1114) Jefferson Middle School Equipment and supplies for CDC classroom interactive effort Anita Morgan, Teacher ($1700) Andersonville Elementary School Balanced literacy books Danielle Rutig, Literacy Coach ($500) Briceville Elementary School Non-fiction library books Janis Bishop, Librarian ($2300) Dutch Valley Elementary School Non-fiction library books Janis Bishop, Librarian ($2300) Oak Ridge Schools Family Resource Center Readers and Leaders Program Jo Bruce, Director ($1400) Oak Ridge Preschool: Listening Center Books and puppets Charlsey Cofer, Teacher ($1000) Delta Kappa Gamma Read to Me program support at Methodist Medical Center Maternity Center Mary Jane Williams, Coordinator ($300) Oak Ridge English as a Second Language Community Literacy Program Materials and supplies for the ESOL program Karen Wilkins-Butz, ESOL Administrator ($1432) For a list of previous years' winners, click here

DISTRIBUTION OF PROCEEDS

Proceeds from the luncheon are used to award competitive grants to organizations whose programs, projects, or activities foster literacy in the area. 

From the proceeds of the 2007 luncheon, we were able to award grants totaling more than $15,000 in 2008.

While this did not come close to covering all the requests we received, it did help make a difference in many people's lives.

Grants went to family reading programs, books for pre-schoolers and elementary school children, and English-as-a-second-language support and GED exam assistance for adults.

Proceeds from the 2008 event are expected to be awarded early in 2009. Those interested in receiving funds should complete and submit an application by October 15.

Successful applications will propose specific projects, programs, or activities that will foster literacy.

While successful applicants are eligible to apply for continued support, all applications will be for one year. All applications will be reviewed on their merits, and subsequent funding is not guaranteed.

Although each application will be considered on its own merits, the following types of grants will normally be precluded from the grant program:

• General operating support   

• Capital fund campaigns

• Endowments

• Grants to individuals

• Grants to religious groups

Grants will be made to community-based groups and organizations that are:

•  Based in and/or have a local presence in a Service Area that includes Oak Ridge

   and/or Anderson and/or Roane counties.

•  Directly serve people who live and/or work in the Service Area.

•  Have volunteers, members, and/or board members who live and/or work in the

   Service Area.

Applicant organizations/groups must be operated and organized so that they do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, gender, age, national origin, or disabilities when they hire staff, let bids, or provide services.

For a list of previous grant recipients, see the link at the bottom of the box that lists this year's awards. For more information about applying for funds, click here. Club members can view the chartering document that establishes the process for distributing funds in the password-protected members-only side of the website (look for the Club Documents page).

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Mim Eichler Rivas spoke at the 2007 Literacy Luncheon.

RECENT SPEAKERS

Recently, we have had the pleasure of hearing from a series of writers, each quite different, but each very well received. In 2006, Appalachian novelist Sharyn McCrumb told a packed house about the writing of St. Dale, her best-selling NASCAR take on The Canterbury Tales.

The 2007 luncheon featured Oak Ridge native Mim Eichler Rivas, co-author of the memoir, The Pursuit of Happyness, which was the basis for a movie starring Will Smith, and Finding Fish, the book on which the Denzel Washington movie, Antoine Fisher, was based.

Mim's book Beautiful Jim Key: The Lost History of the World's Smartest Horse and a Man who Changed the World, is the subject of a documentary film.

Jon Jefferson, left, and Dr. Bill Bass

Nearly 400 people joined us May 8, 2008, when former Oak Ridge National Laboratory science writer Jon Jefferson and University of Tennessee forensic anthropologist Dr. Bill Bass spoke after an evening reception at New Hope Center in Oak Ridge. Bass founded the University of Tennessee Anthropology Research Facility, also known as "The Body Farm," 25 years ago; and he and Jefferson, writing as "Jefferson Bass" have published three novels in which the work at the Body Farm figures prominently. They also have written two non-fiction books about Dr. Bass's career.

In 2009, it was Robert Hicks, best selling novelist whose work has been nominated for the Michael Shaara Award for Excellence in Civil War Fiction; he is also a master storyteller in person, weaving together factual historic accounts in a manner that keeps the audience hanging onto every word. His New York Times bestselling novel, The Widow of the South, centers on the life of Carrie McGavock, mistress of the Franklin, Tennessee, Carnton Plantation. The hardcover release debuted in September 2005 and spent eight weeks on the NY Times Bestseller list.

Terry Kay, an award-winning Georgia writer and author of To Dance With the White Dog, whose novels have been the basis of three Hallmark Hall of Fame movies, was the featured speaker at the 2010 annual fundraiser for local literacy efforts.  

2011 brought us Alex Gabbard of Return to Thunder Road fame, an internationally acclaimed, award winning author of 16 books, hundreds of magazine and newspaper features, and thousands of published photos.

Gabbard won Writer's Digest's "Book of the Year" honors for mainstream literary fiction in 2007 for the historical fiction Gaspee, and he also has received “Book of the Year” and two Moto awards, given by the International Automotive Journalism Association in recognition of premier work in that field. In capturing his Appalachian region “southern upbringing,” his compelling Return to Thunder Road achieved multiple editions and printings as an enduring favorite. Checkmate, a novel of nuclear intrigue set in modern-day Oak Ridge, was considered for film by Red Wagon Entertainment who reviewed the book as “an awfully fun read.”

 
Gabbard, an atomic physicist, retired after 25 years as a research scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. As owner of Gabbard Publications, he has run his business for 30 years as a publisher of books and supplier of magazine and newspaper features and stock photos, the later a lifetime accumulation as participant in many venues, always with a camera in hand. For more information about the author and his books, visit http://www.alexgabbard.com/.

We hope a wide variety of speakers will help us appeal to a wide array of people since we have two goals – to raise money for community efforts and to raise awareness of local literacy problems. The last several years have brought standing-room-only crowds and excellent media coverage.

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COMPLETE LIST OF SPEAKERS

1993  Alex Haley, author of Roots

1994  Wilma Dykeman, Knoxville area author and journalist

1996  Linda W. Billica, NASA astronaut trainer and advisor on Apollo 13

1997  Robert Hass, Poet Laureate of the United States

1998  Jerry Quickley and Robert Carroll, award winning slam poets

1999  Katy Smyser, producer for NBC Dateline

2000  Carolyn Jourdan, award winning documentary film maker

2001  Hon. Paul Simon, retired U.S. Senator, author and professor

2002  Kate Campbell, singer, songwriter, recording artist

2003  Sena Jeter Naslund, award winning author of Ahab’s Wife

2004  Diane Johnson, author and National Book Award finalist of Le Divorce

2005  Shelia Kay Adams, traditional storyteller and author of My Old True Love

2006 Sharyn McCrumb, author of St. Dale and Appalachian ballad novels

2007  Mim Eichler Rivas, author of Beautiful Jim Key : The Lost History of the World's Smartest

           Horse and a Man who Changed the World

2008  Jon Jefferson and Dr. Bill Bass, New York Times bestselling authors who write fiction as

           "Jefferson Bass"

2009  Robert Hicks, New York Times bestselling author of Widow of the South

2010  Terry Kay, author of To Dance With the White Dog

2011  Alex Gabbard, author of Return to Thunder Road

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INFORMATION FOR AUTHORS

Because our entire effort is centered around providing support to local literacy organizations, we have very limited means to provide travel expenses and room accommodations for our speakers. Hobson/Yoder Financial Services graciously underwrites basic expenses each year. In return, they normally sponsor a second event for their clients that is held in conjunction with the luncheon.

Several of our speakers have been willing to make other appearances during their visits – at local schools, for example – and recent years have seen a partnership with the Oak Ridge Public Library for a "One City, One Book" effort. This is all coordinated based on the schedule and willingness of the speaker to address more than one organization.

If you are interested in speaking or have a speaker to suggest, please Contact Us with details.

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