Club News

Martha Washington Questers 1032 met on May 27, at the home of Virginia Reighard with eight members present. President Virginia opened the meeting with the reciting of the Questers Invocation. The treasury report was given and approved.

Janet Peterson and Linda Newlon reported on their trip to the International Questers Convention in Des Moines, which they attended on May 20-21. Vicki Ealy, Jane Fehr and Virginia also attended.

The Questers program sheet was passed around again to fill in for the upcoming new year for hostesses and programs.

Members discussed their June outing, which will be Friday, June 17. They will meet at Vicki Ealy?s home at 8 a.m. and travel to Independence, where they will tour the home built by Frank Lloyd Wright at Cedar Rock State Park at Quasqueton. A motion was made by Janet to give a donation to the park for the restoration of their boat house. Linda seconded, and the motion passed. The group will eat lunch at Bill?s Pizza and Smokehouse. After lunch they may visit a flower garden and an antique shop and then go through the Wapsipinicon Mill Museum before heading home.

The program was given by Virginia on ?Coffee and Related Items.? Coffee seems to have been first known by the Ethiopians of northern Africa. From there, coffee spread to Arabia early in the 15th century. Arabian merchants made the first effort to cultivate and commercialize coffee, adding it to their shipments of spices and other luxuries from the Orient. Coffee was introduced to the Turks in the 16th century, and 100 years later in London. Arabia continued to be the only source of coffee supply until 1690. In that year, seeds were sent to the Dutch East Indies and to Holland and eventually to the New World. Among the principal coffee-growing countries today are Colombia, Venezuela, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Mexico, Jamaica, Haiti and Cuba, which all add their distinctive types. When coffee plants are 18 inches high, they are transplanted to plantations; from the second to the fourth year they begin bearing fruit. The fruit will be a dark red to purple when picked. After picking, it then goes through a sluice separating ripe and unripe berries. The berries then go through pulping machines, then hulling and peeling. They are then shipped to their destinations, where they are blended and roasted to give consumers all kinds of tastes and flavors. Today, there are Starbucks and coffee houses everywhere, giving customers anything they want in coffees; and Keurig coffee machines, which prepare a cup of fresh-brewed coffee in a minute. Virginia shared a variety of antique coffeepots, milk jugs, and teakettles, and also a very old copper Turkish coffeepot.

Dessert was served by Maurine Roberts, co-hostess, along with several different kinds of coffee in a variety of cups and saucers.