Torch Club members enjoying a laugh at recent meeting include, from left, Jean Goodnow, Delta College President, speaker Crystal McMorris, club president John VanLooy, and former presidents Frank Quinn and Milt Higgs. Saginaw Valley Torch Club Provides Intellectual Platform for Region
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Former President of the Saginaw Valley Torch Club Hal Arman described the group this way:
"Torch Club is an international association of local clubs in which respected persons enjoy the cultural interchange of knowledge."
The first Torch Club was organized in 1924 and by 1928-29 the Saginaw Valley had been established. Originally it was restricted to "members of the learned professions."
(MyBayCity Photo by Dave Rogers)
Local Torch clubs are in 75 locations in the United States and Canada. Each has a monthly dinner meeting, highlighted by presentation of a paper by a member or guest on a topic of concern to modern society. Following the presentation, the members discuss the subject.
Some of the more erudite papers are published in the group's international magazine, "The Torch."
Arman, former Delta College assistant to the president, recalled one of the more colorful moments in the club's 80-year history, being celebrated this year:
"Members were entranced when 'Tink' Campbell (at that time chief legal counsel for the Dow Chemical Company) dimmed the lights, enlisted the help of a fellow member to dress in Renaissance garb and pour each member a glass of vintage port as Tink donned a flowing robe and proceeded to quote from memory long passages from the various plays of Shakespeare."
Arman dealt with the basic function of the club that he described as having a "somewhat naive purpose." He ruminated: "That good people, before and after an excellent meal, could learn some new facts about a situation, engage in some civilized discussion about what they had learned, and go out into the community with some new perspectives on that problem, which they would share with other community members they might encounter."
In fact Arman recalled that the local Torch Club filled an extremely positive function. "Ernie Britton (Dow official), in a personal taped oral history with this author, said that the idea for Delta College originated at a Torch meeting when the superintendents of the three major school districts started a dialog on what they were going to do with the crisis of large numbers of men returning to the area after their overseas duty was completed in World War II. Bay City Junior College was already in existence, but it was small and not equipped to handle many more people outside of its district. Saginaw had already hired a person who was going to start a junior college for that city."
The fact that the Torch Club meets in the august 19th century Saginaw Club adds the charm of the Victorian era, along with the fact that a group dedicated to intellectual pursuits is somewhat of an anomaly today.
As the club enters its 80th year, somewhat unheralded, its president is retired Essexville English teacher John VanLooy. Recent speakers have included Leeds Bird, stalwart of the Bay City Players, discussing creativity, and Crystal McMorris, former Bay City Times columnist, now interning at Delta College as an English instructor, discussing consumerism and communications.
Last year's topics included F. Scott Fitzgerald, with retired professor Pat Eggelston delving into the Roaring Twenties figure, financier Mark Denay on "Old Ethical Principles for the New Corporate Culture;" and Midlander Bob Belfit on the technical topic "Petroleum vs. Soy Beans as a Source of Chemicals in Industrial Applications."
Recent presidents of Torch have included Delta College finance officer Debra K. Lutz, attorneys Frank M. Quinn and David B. Meyer and George Heron, retired director of United Way of Bay County.
The local club has about 70 members, of which 40-50 normally attend the meetings held October through May each year. Members are from all areas of the tri-county community and include teachers, college and university instructors and officials, lawyers and judges, scientists and chemical engineers, journalists and bankers and industrialists, physicians and business owners. A good number are retired but still active in community life.
Mr. Heron, who is director of Torch Region 6, commented recently in the club's online publication Torchlight: "In District 6, five of our seven clubs were established in the heyday of service club growth in the early decades of the 20th century. The clubs have continued to thrive because Torch is not encumbered with facilities, fund raising ventures, myriad traditions, codes or bureaucracy. Torch is service club 'lite' consisting of fellowship, scholarly presentations and intellectual discussion." ###
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