Councilmember Alex Pedersen spoke to the Club on August 20, 2020. He represents the Fourth Council District, which is Northeast Seattle. He was elected in 2019 and his term of office runs through 2023.

In his remarks, Councilmember Pedersen spoke about a wide array of Seattle issues covering everything from the cuts in the Navigation Team to dealing with electric scooters.

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Several of our members were quite dismayed by his treatment by protesters over the last several months. Those in favor of a fifty percent cut in the police force budget have shown up at his home five times in the last few weeks in what must have been frightening episodes. The first was at 10:45 at night with his wife, children, and a sleepover child friend. Councilmember Pedersen has been forced to move his family out of his house.

The Councilmember answered several questions including one about the new district elections in Seattle. He noted that only Portland still has the at-large system in the USA and that voting at-large is very rare. He expressed hope that, over time, the district elections would prove to be a successful system.

By Tom Ranken

Bill McCutcheon made a return performance speaking to the club on August 13, 2020. He presented a overview primer on US Navy flight operations on an aircraft carrier. He highlighted a 1956 tour of duty that he took aboard the USS Lexington in the Pacific. He gave a fascinating talk on what it was like to be working on a carrier and covered many different aspects.

Here is link to a three minute video of 2019 carrier flight operations aboard the USS John C. Stennis that Bill recommended.

Ironically, my father was a Supply Corp officer on the same ship at the same time. My recollection is that he bought a camera on the trip in Japan and was an avid photographer. Below you will find some of the pictures of the trip.

Bill is a retired CPA and business consultant.  He received a BA in Business Administration in Accounting from the University of Washington. In the Navy. he served aboard aircraft carriers and on anti-sub patrol aircraft.  He also holds a private pilot certificate.  

Bill is a Docent and a member of the Board of Trustees at The Museum of Flight. 

As a Docent, he is a tour guide, instructor in docent training and youth education, member of the museum’s Speakers’ Bureau and has been involved in all aspects of docent leadership.   

His public speaking engagements on aviation history include: The Museum of Flight, Seattle; Historic Flight Foundation, Paine Field; Washington Aviation Conference; Washington Seaplane Pilots Assn.; Quiet Birdmen, Seattle Hangar; 446th Airlift Wing-Jt. Base Lewis-McChord; 93rd Bomb Group reunion and other civic, community and retirement organizations.”

Our program on August 6, 2020, featured Dr. Amitabha “Guppy” Gupta of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.  Dr. Gupta is the scientific content strategist for the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center Philanthropy Department; and was formerly part of the Fred Hutch Basic Sciences team.  Dr. Gupta has a BA in Molecular Biology from Colgate and a PhD from Columbia in Cell/Cellular and Molecular Biology.

You can find Dr. Gupta’s slides here.

Surprisingly, Dr. Gupta noted that a quarter of the researchers at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center were doing viral work.

To achieve ‘herd immunity’ from Covid-19, 60-70% of the population must become immune from the disease.  This can occur as the result of natural immunity (recovering from the illness) or from vaccines.  In some ways, both accomplish the same thing:  The body is ‘taught’ to fight the virus.

Dr. Gupta noted that social distancing and masks are effective at reducing transmission.  He recommended wearing masks—even while running.

The virus, he said, enters the lungs and makes lots of copies of itself, destroying macrophages.

He talked about mechanisms to defeat the virus:  Neutralization blocks the process in which the virus binds to cells.  Opsonization and sensitization/complement activation reduce the severity of the disease.

Dr. Gupta noted that is normal for antibodies to fade in the body following the illness.  If re-exposed, however, the body will manufacture new antibodies to fight the disease.

The first vaccine was for smallpox.  It was discovered in 1796.  Twenty million people died from small pox in the twentieth century.  It required 184 years to fully eradicate the disease (in 1980).

The current research to acquire a vaccine against Covid-19 is radically different.  Normally, vaccine approval requires three phases of trials which normally require from five to more than seven years of trials.  Operation Warp Speed, he said, is combining all three phases.  There is, he said, “a level of collaboration never seen before.”  Normally, there are 2-3 trials of vaccines; there are 157 vaccines in trials as of July 29 in development.  Thirty-five of these efforts are now in clinical trials.

While there is never certainty in science, there is reason for great optimism in these development efforts.

Thank you to David and Pam Mushen for securing this program.

• To learn more about the work of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center on COVID-19, go to: www.fredhutch.org/coronavirus
• To participate in the vaccine trial, go to: www.coronaviruspreventionnetwork.org
• To donate to the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, go to: www.fredhutch.org/give
• To ask Dr. Gupta more questions, email: agupta@fredhutch.org

Our program on Thursday, July 30, 2020, featured Phil Reid, Ph.D, Vice Provost for Academic & Student Affairs at the University of Washington.

Dr. Reid is responsible for initiatives and services that improve the student and faculty experience at the University of Washington. Activities include development and support of modern pedagogy, instructional space planning, alignment of student curricular and co-curricular activities, student success and retention analytics, development and deployment of IT systems that support teaching and learning, support of enrollment management, development and support of faculty development initiatives. Dr. Reid is a Professor of Chemistry.

Dr. Reid told is that the University of Washington began to monitor the coronavirus as early as January 2020.

The campus is not closed today, but is scaled back. Approximately 2,000 people are still working there.

Making the quick shift to online programs was a challenge. Two thousand students requested financial aid for things like food, rent and Internet access. Many students, he said, were really struggling. Two thousand computers were sent out in two days. Zoom is now a normal part of the workings of the University–the license for which was only first activated this year.

For the fall, Dr. Reid is planning for a hybrid instructional model. there will be some programs that require onsite instruction, such as labs. Many programs, including large classroom settings, will be fully online.

The residence halls are open, but are expected to be abut sixty percent of capacity.

Dr. Reid was generous in answering questions. He closed by noting that the University of Washington is more than an academic institution. It is an institution of learning, fellowship, and community.

Important roles that are compromised under the current conditions.

Our speaker on July 23, 2020 was Bill McCutcheon. Bill is a member of the Board of Trustees and a Docent at The Museum of Flight.  As a Docent, he is a tour guide and an instructor in docent training and youth education. He is a member of the museum’s Speakers’ Bureau and has been involved in all aspects of docent leadership.  His public speaking engagements on aviation history include: The Museum of Flight, Seattle; Historic Flight Foundation, Paine Field; Washington Aviation Conference; Washington Seaplane Pilots Assn.; Quiet Birdmen, Seattle Hangar; 446^th Airlift Wing-Jt. Base Lewis-McChord; 93^rd Bomb Group reunion and other civic, community and retirement organizations. Bill is a retired CPA and business consultant.  He received a BA in Business Administration in Accounting from the University of Washington.  In the Navy, he served aboard aircraft carriers and on anti-sub patrol aircraft.  He also holds a private pilot certificate.

Bill spoke about a 1931 effort to fly around the world. Led by Clyde “Upside Down” Pangborn (1895-1958), the endeavor was to break the world record for flying around the world. They failed at that goal on the trip, but Pangborn and co-pilot Hugh Herndon Jr. flew their plane, Miss Veedol, on the first non-stop flight across the Pacific Ocean.

Before taking off, the existing record (twenty-one days) was broken, so the new objective was to fly around the world in less than eight days and fifteen hours. Weather in Siberia grounded the plane and made that objective impossible.

In Japan, however, they learned of another prize that they could achieve: the first Trans-Pacific flight. Following seven weeks of being under arrest for taking pictures that were considered spying by Japan, they plane took off for Washington.

Co-pilot Herndon erred so badly on the flight that they nearly crashed multiple times (his mother financed the expedition), but they made it to Wenatchee, WA. They landed on October 5, 1931, after a flight of 41 hours and thirteen minutes and 4500 miles.

There was an award of $25,000. “Upside Down Pangborn received only $2500 for his efforts.

Our speaker on July 16 was Rob Talafous. Rob is a sales executive with Georgia-Pacific.

While Georgia-Pacific has many customers and sales people, Rob’s only customer is Costco. Rob reviewed the impact the pandemic had on toilet paper sales at Costco and offered his insights into this product that we use so often and know so little about.

Costco is Georgia-Pacific’s largest worldwide customer with $2 billion in sales of Kirkland Signature Bath Tissue, Paper Towels and Napkins as well as other Georgia-Pacific brands like Dixie disposable table top items, Vanity Fair premium napkins and Marathon “away from home products.”

Before joining Georgia-Pacific, Rob was already a consumer packaged goods professional (Coca-Cola and Kraft-Hines). He also spent five years in a startup business that he co-founded.

A former member of the ice hockey team at St. Cloud University in Minnesota, Rob and his wife moved to the Seattle area in 2014 to be closer to his big customer.

By the end of February 2020, Rob, Costco, and Georgia-Pacific were seeing a hurricane in the purchase of home tissue products. sales were up 75 percent. Initially, this was a regional phenomenon, but it quickly spread globally.

Why did it happen? Rob offered several lines of reasoning:

Because to the nature of the industry, manufacture of these products is constant. There manufacturing capacity runs 24/7 with little safety stock. Hence, when demand surged, there was little capacity to increase stock and existing inventories were wiped out quickly.

Because of the shelter-in-place orders, more residential products were needed–and less workplace product. Retail outlets sold out of toilet paper and home tissue products; office product demand declined significantly. These are different markets with different qualities and brands.

Even when customers didn’t need it, they began to be concerned about having enough and adequacy to purchase–so they bought more than they needed.

Because people were at home more, they began to use more of all home tissue products for cleaning and increased hand washing.

Home products are still in heavy demand: 25-35% of Costco outlets are sold out every day.

Rob was great and provoked a lot of questions.

Our program on July 9 featured Margy Heldring, Co-Chair of Grandmothers Against Gun Violence.

Margy is a retired clinical psychologist. She has served as clinical faculty in the University of Washington Department of Family Medicine. In addition, she was a health care legislative assistant to two former U.S. Senators: Bill Bradley and Paul Wellstone. She was a senior policy advisor on Bill Bradley’s presidential campaign, and was the founder and Executive Director of the national nonprofit, America’s HealthTogether. She delights in being a thriving grandmother.

Grandmothers Against Gun Violence was formed in response to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings and is an advocacy group seeking changes in gun laws.

Margy began her presentation by noting that there are several categories of gun violence. The most prevalent is suicide. Other categories include interpersonal events, mass killings (four or more deaths), police shootings, and gang violence.

All of these events, she said, have two things in common: Access to a gun and a person not using the weapon responsibly. The centerpiece of the efforts of the Grandmothers Against Gun Violence is, she said, keeping guns out of the hands of people that shouldn’t have them and correct storage. They are not opponents of the Second Amendment.

Margy noted that, in the wake of the attempted assassination of President Reagan, Congress had passed an assault rifle ban that sunset in 2004. There is no similar law in Washington.

Margy believes that a consensus is developing in Washington to pass legislation. She noted that there had been three gun initiatives in recent years. One requires background checks on gun purchases. Another raised the age for which assault rifles can be purchased from eighteen to twenty-one. A third implemented ERPO (Extreme Risk Protection Orders). She is hopeful that the 2021 legislature might pass bi-partisan law dealing with suicide prevention. There will likely be an effort to ban assault rifles, as well.

Research on gun violence as a public health issue has not been well funded, she said. Grandmothers Against Gun Violence has made funded one study that found that one-third of Washington households have guns. Two-thirds of the households with guns also indicated that the guns were not safely stored.

Margy generously answered a number of questions.