May 18, 2005: Headlines: COS - Lesotho: Awards: African American Issues: Corvallis Gazette Times: NAACP honors Lesotho RPCV Mike Beilstein for serving organization
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May 18, 2005: Headlines: COS - Lesotho: Awards: African American Issues: Corvallis Gazette Times: NAACP honors Lesotho RPCV Mike Beilstein for serving organization
NAACP honors Lesotho RPCV Mike Beilstein for serving organization
NAACP honors Lesotho RPCV Mike Beilstein for serving organization
NAACP honors Beilstein for serving organization
By Erin Madison
Gazette-Times reporter
Despite his list of accomplishments, Mike Beilstein, the recipient of the Corvallis NAACP's Harry and Molly Goheen Award, remains modest.
"I don't know if anything I've done is extraordinary," Beilstein said.
The Corvallis chapter of the NAACP presented the award Friday to Beilstein at its annual Freedom Fund Banquet. The award recognizes life-long service to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
Beilstein is secretary for the Corvallis chapter.
"He's very much loved," said Esmeralda Allen, president of the chapter. "He's a very nice man. He's very caring."
He has served as chapter secretary for eight of the last 10 years.
"The first time I attended a meeting, they made me secretary," he said. "The secretary is, in a sense, like the board of directors for the NAACP."
Beilstein is responsible for setting meeting agendas, in addition to the "normal secretary type stuff," such as taking notes and writing minutes, he said.
Beilstein admits the job has been a considerable amount of work. However, for the two years he wasn't secretary, he didn't like it, he said, because agendas and minutes were often late.
In addition to his work at the NAACP, Beilstein served as a Corvallis City Council member from 1998 to 2000.
He ran for a seat on the council to help pass a living-wage ordinance. The council had refused to take on the issue, he recalled, so Beilstein made it a priority, and it passed.
"That was one of my few accomplishments," he said.
He also served in the Peace Corps in the '70s after graduating from college. He worked in Leshtho, a town in eastern South Africa.
Beilstein continues to work as a research chemist at Oregon State University. He primarily does research on nutrition and metabolism.
"To this day he continues to fight for universal health care," Allen said of Beilstein.
The Freedom Fund Banquet included dinner, musical entertainment and two keynote speakers: Mayor Helen Berg and A.J. Talley, executive director of the Community Alliance for Diversity.
The theme of the banquet was "Corvallis: A Welcoming Community." The speakers focused on how Corvallis is working to become a more welcoming community, especially to students and others affiliated with the university.
About 150 people attended the event and the organization made about $2,000, said treasurer Todd Allen.
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Story Source: Corvallis Gazette Times
This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - Lesotho; Awards; African American Issues
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