House Bill hb9125

    Florida House of Representatives - 2002                HR 9125

        By Representative Spratt






  1                         House Resolution

  2         A resolution honoring philanthropist Kenneth

  3         Curtis, of LaBelle.

  4

  5         WHEREAS, growing up in a mining town in upper Michigan

  6  where people worked hard and luxuries were scarce, Kenneth

  7  Curtis turned down a scholarship from the University of

  8  Michigan in 1922 and went to work digging sewer ditches to

  9  enable his mother, widowed when Kenneth was 12, to give up her

10  job in a corset factory, and

11         WHEREAS, all too familiar with circumstances that

12  sometimes force individuals to choose between an education and

13  work, Kenneth Curtis was recently honored for having afforded

14  an opportunity for a broader array of career options to 1,000

15  teens in a rural community where most people are farmers or

16  ranchers and job opportunities are limited, and

17         WHEREAS, for more than a decade, through the Isabella

18  Curtis Scholarship program set up as a tribute to his late

19  wife, 96-year-old Kenneth Curtis has paid Edison Community

20  College tuition, book fees, and a $700 annual travel stipend

21  on behalf of any LaBelle High School graduate with a "C"

22  average or above who desired an education beyond the secondary

23  level, and an endowed scholarship fund guarantees that the

24  program will continue after his death, and

25         WHEREAS, Kenneth Curtis is a man of simple tastes who

26  has stated that he hasn't bought anything new in dress

27  clothing in 20 years and that his most extravagant past

28  indulgence was smoking a cigar at a burlesque show, until, in

29  1997, he "got the bug" for a Rolls-Royce and paid $52,000 for

30  the 1958 midnight blue classic with red interior, from which

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    Florida House of Representatives - 2002                HR 9125

    587-167-02






  1  he derived immense pleasure when he drove it to go fishing,

  2  and

  3         WHEREAS, the stir created in LaBelle in 1997 by the

  4  arrival of the Silver Cloud was revived recently when Kenneth

  5  Curtis donated the vintage Rolls to Hope Hospice in Fort

  6  Myers, stipulating only that it be used in some way as a

  7  fundraiser for the organization that provides comfort for

  8  terminally ill patients and their grieving families, NOW,

  9  THEREFORE,

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11  Be It Resolved by the House of Representatives of the State of

12  Florida:

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14         That the House of Representatives pauses in its

15  deliberations to honor Kenneth Curtis, a man whose generosity

16  and compassion have brought opportunity, hope, and comfort to

17  hundreds of Florida residents.

18         BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that a copy of this resolution

19  be presented to Kenneth Curtis as a tangible token of the

20  sentiments expressed herein.

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