In Praise of Youth
by Paul W. Lucas
On Monday, the Odessa Optimist Club will host its 45th annual Youth Appreciation Banquet. This year’s program will be held at Barn G of the Ector County Coliseum, and will recognize almost 300 outstanding youth in our community — with expected attendance of more than 1,000 people. This event offers junior high and high schools in Ector County the opportunity to recognize our outstanding youth through a broad array of categories — such as athletics, music, academics and community service.
Youth Appreciation Week was started in 1955 by an Optimist Club in North Carolina, becoming a signature program of Optimist International in 1957. It was brought to Odessa in 1965 by an Optimist club member who had just moved from Wichita Falls. That member was Glen Atkins — a true Odessa statesman and treasure. While this will be the 45th annual banquet, regrettably it will be the first without Glen who passed away in May — but it serves as an example of how the legacy of people with positive vision and leadership lives on in our community.
The Odessa Youth Appreciation Banquet has grown over these 45 years through the hard work of many members, and the incredible assistance of the Odessa Chuck Wagon Gang. The first event recognized 12 outstanding youth, but rapidly outgrew both the basement of the Lincoln Hotel and Barn A, and has been held at Barn G for the last 30 years. The Odessa banquet is recognized as the largest Youth Appreciation event of the 2,000 such events conducted by Optimist Clubs across the U.S., Canada and the Caribbean. In recent years, this program was honored as the outstanding community service event out of the 65,000 conducted annually by Optimist Clubs. Due to these recognitions, this year’s banquet will feature Optimist International President Danny Rodgers.
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt stated, “We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future.” The Odessa Optimist Club seeks to recognize the youth in our community who are having a positive impact, doing their best, and making our community a better place — not only today, but for the future. While the Optimist International motto is “Bringing Out the Best in Kids,” the Odessa Optimist Club continues to expand this and seeks to “Bring Out the Best in Kids, Our Community, and our Members.”
Please join me in offering congratulations to the outstanding kids recognized at the 45th annual Odessa Optimist Youth Appreciation Banquet!
