Rotary Club Members Add Magic to Community Support

By Dan Shryock

There was smoke. There were mirrors. There was a magician. Most importantly, there were 80 people coming together to support West Salem education.

The Rotary Club of West Salem gathered on May 21 for its annual fundraising dinner, a 1920s-themed event titled “Smoke & Mirrors.” Club members and friends assembled at 620 Collective, a Portland Road venue, for dinner and entertainment.

A small smoke machine provided a mysterious, foggy backdrop as magician and mentalist Finn Joseph, a West Salem native, baffled his audience. Bedazzled dresses glittered, reflecting the shimmering wardrobes of an Art Deco era 100 years ago.

Still, everyone’s shared motive that evening was clear. They were there to help raise money to support the Rotary club’s local and international education and humanitarian efforts.

Much of the $9,000 raised stays at home. The club awards $6,000 in scholarships to West Salem students each year. They also support 10 local teachers with $500 classroom grants to help pay for special projects and materials “so that they do not have to continue reaching into their own pockets to support their students,” club president Paul Hamilton said.

“I don't think people realize how much the teachers just spend out of their own pockets (for materials),” he said. “They only get to deduct about $250 on their tax returns, and they pay way more than that.

“Giving back to the teachers who are really putting a lot of investment into our children is huge, and so we want to try to expand that,” Hamilton said.

The dinner event offered several ways to contribute to the cause. The ticket price included a buffet meal featuring pork tenderloin and gluten-free hazelnut-crusted, apricot-glazed chicken by Salem’s Elegant Catering. A 50/50 raffle netted a lucky ticketholder $400, and a silent auction offered a variety of items, ranging from an olive oil collection to two three-night stays at Oregon Coast beach houses.

And, the club also accepted direct donations to its West Salem Rotary Foundation, which was created in 2025.

“Our impact extends far beyond our local community,” Hamilton said. “We’d also like to try to get into some other programs that we haven't done before, physically doing things in the community, and pursuing these donations really helps us. The foundation allows us to do that.”

The local club also supports larger humanitarian efforts by the international Rotary organization, contributing to worldwide initiatives. Partnering with other Rotary clubs, the 35-member group helps projects such as building health centers in Uganda and Guatemala.

“I think this is probably a point in time in our country, and probably in the world, where Rotary is needed more than ever,” Hamilton said. “We want to bring people together who want to get involved in building their communities. That's our focus.”

The jewelry-strewn and bow tie-wearing audience, while there to support Rotary’s mission of “service before self,” were also ready for Finn Joseph’s act, and he successfully kept people guessing throughout the evening. The magician displayed card tricks and sleight of hand before delving deeper, seemingly reading volunteers’ minds.

After one demonstration, an attendee turned to a friend and whispered, “That’s sorcery.”

“To call it sorcery? That makes me feel good,” Joseph said when told of the reaction. “I never try to give people the impression that I'm a psychic. I don't read minds. I read people, and I use my five senses to give the impression of a sixth sense.

“Sorcery. That’s humbling. I really appreciate it when people say things like that.”

He closed his show with a mathematics exercise in which the audience was encouraged to play along using their own phone calculators. After entering a series of multiplications and additions, Joseph asked Connie Williams to enter a random eight-digit number. The resulting combination equaled 2,652,1830.

“What time is it?” he asked the group.

It was 8:30 p.m. on May 21, 2026.

That, Joseph slyly explained later without revealing his secret, was “a moment of astonishment.”

The dinner was sponsored by West Salem’s Red Hawk Winery, Fitzpatrick Painting and Construction, Salem Electric, and Hamilton Tax and Accounting.

To learn more about West Salem Rotary, please visit - enter website or qr code to website.