By Curt Hogg, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

GERMANTOWN - At the end of every baseball season, Homestead head coach Ernie Millard goes down the line, hugging each of his players one-by-one.

He expected it to be a bit harder, a bit more bittersweet to make the trip down the row this season. He didn’t expect it to be this hard.

One of the longest-tenured summer baseball coaches in the state, Millard saw his career at the helm of the Highlanders end Monday, when Germantown senior Colin Sackett’s walk-off single in the eighth inning downed Homestead, 8-7, in a  sectional semifinal. Earlier in the year Millard announced that this would be his final season as the Highlanders head coach, retiring after 26 years on the job.

“I thought I had prepared myself for it, but it was very, very difficult,” Millard said of the postgame tradition. “The one thing I did a little differently this time was I hugged my seniors first. Normally I hug my sophomores and my juniors because I’m going to get to see them next year. But it hit me that I won’t be coaching any of them next year.”

As the public address announcer at Germantown thanked Millard for his years of service, a fan from behind the Homestead dugout said what was on the minds of many:

“All class, all the way through the very end, Ernie.”

A princess, 3 prime ministers, and a former first lady join 25,000 in Toronto to celebrate Rotary’s good work and plan more of it

By Arnold R. Grahl and Geoff Johnson Photos by Alyce Henson

Toronto, the Capital of Nice, opened its arms this week to welcome 25,652 Rotarians from around the world, who came to Rotary’s annual convention looking for inspiration — and finding it.

Whether it was by seeing old friends in the hallways, making new connections in the House of Friendship, or listening to eloquent speakers at general sessions, attendees found plenty at the 109th Rotary International Convention to remind them of the fellowship that binds them and the diversity that Rotary embodies.

“Now, we are sisters forever,” said Rhonda Panczyk, of the Rotary Club of Rochester, Michigan, USA, after spotting and embracing Ijeoma Pearl Okoro, past governor of District 9141 (Nigeria). The two women had met at the West African Project Fair last year, partnered on an immunization drive, and kept in touch on Facebook.

By Joe Queenan in The Rotarian 

The last time I broke bread with my former college roommate Chris, we dined in a nondescript Italian restaurant on the outskirts of Philadelphia. A few months later, Chris would succumb to kidney failure, heart failure, and a bevy of other illnesses. 

Also in attendance that evening were two of my childhood friends, Joe and Richie, and Richie’s wife, Mary. Mary had been taught to cook by Richie’s mother, and each time I ate at her house it was like going back 50 years to the glorious era when Mrs. Giardinelli held sway over the kitchen. Chris had met Richie and Mary only that morning when they unexpectedly showed up with mops and buckets and volunteered to clean his house from top to bottom, taking eight hours to do so. Because of his illness, his house was a wreck.

“You don’t even know Chris,” I told Richie, marveling at their generosity.

“We know you,” he replied.