May 31, 2017 By Harry Funk 4 min read

As an original member of the McMurray Rotary Club, Russ Wylie would joke that he was the most important of the founders.

“You see,” he’d say, “back in those days, it took 25 members to get a charter. Well, when they came for me, I was the 25th member to join. Without me, there would be no charter, no McMurray Rotary Club and no 50th anniversary.”

When the Peters Township organization celebrated half a century in 2015, three of the founders still were active members: James Russell Wylie, William Edward Holt and Paul R. Owens Sr.

With Mr. Owens’ death on May 30 at age 83, all have passed away this year. Mr. Holt, 86, died Jan. 27, and Mr. Wylie, 88, on May 6.

“As a young member – I still consider still a newer member of this club – all three of those guys, and one just as much as the other, were so influential for me to understand what the process of Rotary is all about, really,” Cliff Milowicki, club president, said. “There wasn’t a meeting I attended that, if those guys were there, I was having a conversation with them about what’s going on in the club, what we’re doing. And frankly, they probably are as much of a reason as any reason that I stayed in the club.”

All three were prominent in the business community, which in turn led to their involvement with Rotary International and its long history of philanthropy.

Holt was a realtor, broker, builder and developer, working with real estate in Peters Township starting in the 1950s. That decade, Wylie built Rolling Green Golf Course in Somerset Township, followed by Lindenwood in North Strabane, which opened in 1965.

Owens, who owned Pro Cleaners in Peters and Value Cleaners in Union Township, was diagnosed with cancer in the mid-1970s.

“Paul told me 40 years ago that his doctor told him he had six months to live,” Bill Gullborg, a McMurray Rotary Club member since 1968, recalled. “He went to Mass and said, ‘Lord, I can’t come now. I have eight children and a business to run. You just tell my doctors what to do, and I’ll do it.'”

Three of his children – Kathleen Levinsky, Karen Henze and Paul Owens Jr. – preceded him in death.

“He was very affected by all that happened with his family, but he always, always maintained his faith,” Tony Zuloaga, a past club president, said. “I never, ever heard him say anything bad about anybody. Never.”

Jim Mortimer recalled Owens as a fellow member who made it a point to attend as many club meetings and events as possible. He made particular mention of the club’s fundraising gala a few years ago, when Mortimer was serving one of his two terms as president:

“Paul was pretty sick. He was in the hospital, and he said to me, ‘I’m sorry. I won’t be able to be there.’ So the gala was going on, and I walked to the front desk to see how things were going. And Paul Owens was sitting at the front desk. He said, ‘I just got out of the hospital, and I don’t want to miss the gala.'”

Milowicki mentioned that although the club has experienced growth this year, he feels a tinge of sadness when looking at some of the names on the roster with regard to three names that are missing.

“These are all our new members,” he said, “and those people aren’t going to have the benefit of the influence from these guys that I had.”