Several years ago, I shared a brief story about the Albemarle Optimist Club. An interesting accomplishment of the group was the fact there were two members, Dr. Carl Bowen and Dr. J.C. Boone, who served terms as the president of the entire Optimist International organization. (Dr. Bowen served during 1963-64 and Dr. Boone during 1995-96). Later, I found out that another Stanly County service organization had a similar honor. The Civitan Club that was based in Richfield had two members serve as the president of Civitan International. Club member Francis Essic, left, who was Pfeiffer’s head basketball and golf coach, held the office of president during 1967-68. Jim Ritchie, right, was president during 1980-81. On a side note, according to the July 6, 1979 edition of the Stanly News & Press, at that time, Ritchie had sponsored more than 100 new members for various Civitan clubs and was involved with chartering 36 new clubs. {Lewis Bramlett – Stanly County Historical Society}