Rotarians

The U. S. Rotarians, who voyaged on an excursion to Ostend, Belgium, for the Rotary International convention (TIME, June 6), listened with rapt attention to King Albert of Belgium last week. His Majesty, himself a Rotarian, praised the U. S. delegates "whose crossing of the Atlantic--the Atlantic which your fellow countryman, Captain Lindbergh, crossed alone in some 30 hours--is indeed an important event. It proves the strength of Rotarian feeling and co-operative spirit."

Later the Rotarians elected Arthur H. Sapp of Huntington, Ind., president of the Rotary International. He had no opposition.

President Sapp. Arthur H. Sapp, 44, lawyer, thrice an Indiana prosecuting attorney, is a tall, light-haired gentleman, a mainstay of Huntington culture, a pillar of the Methodist Episcopal church. He attended Ohio Wesleyan and Chicago universities and Indiana Law School; is a member of Phi Delta Theta fraternity. President Sapp, always dressed de rigueur, may often be seen, when affairs do not take him from Huntington, striding between the courthouse and his Jefferson street office. He is married, has one child, owns a motor car.

Ice-House Octet. Among the U. S. "stunts" that entertained the Europeans was the singing of the icehouse octet from Toledo. Eight businessmen, wearing clean blue flannel shirts, sporting ice picks painted red, sang, led by Mortician Jeffery V. Harris:

So louder now my song I'll swell,

Rotary, my Rotary;

And make it ring o'er hill and dell,

Rotary, my Rotary.

Significance. "Ever since the War, they [European businessmen] have earnestly and wistfully studied . . . American business methods," wrote a New York Times editor last week. "They may now see representatives of that interesting class in the mass. ... It will be an education and a surprise for the Continentals to learn of the extraordinary degree to which we have carried the combination of business with pleasure, or at least business with luncheon." German businessmen have asked Rotarian President Sapp to remain in Europe for a time to get German rotary clubs well organized.