Rotarians to present Service with coveted G.E. Meads Award

OCTV Station Manager William Service will receive the G.E. Meads Award from the Rotary Club of Oxford. Photo  by C.J. Carnacchio.
OCTV Station Manager William Service will receive the G.E. Meads Award from the Rotary Club of Oxford. Photo
by C.J. Carnacchio.

An Oxford club dedicated to community service is honoring a local man who literally has ‘service’ in his name.

William Service was named the 2018 recipient of the Rotary Club of Oxford’s prestigious G.E. Meads Award. He will receive it during a Tuesday, April 24 luncheon at the Oxford Public Library. It begins at noon.

“I was shocked,” said Service, the station manager for Oxford Community Television (OCTV). “I just do what I do. Anything I can do to help people, I usually do.”

Established in 2000, the G.E. Meads Award is presented to a non-Rotarian who exemplifies the club’s motto “Service Above Self” by making significant contributions to the community.

Over the years, Service has been heavily involved in Oxford, from leading American Legion Post 108 and promoting all of its activities and accomplishments to transforming OCTV into a respected, award-winning media outlet that chronicles nearly every facet of local life, including government meetings, sporting events, school activities, concerts, businesses, parades and festivals.

“He’s a person who does what he does not for the recognition, but to make the community a better place,” said Rotary Club President-elect Bryan Cloutier, director of the Oxford Public Library.

The award is named for the late Dr. G.E. Meads, a local dentist who helped charter Oxford’s Rotary Club in 1937 and served as its first president.

Past recipients include Mildred Schmidt, Dianne Offer, Duane Salswedel, Ian Smith, Helen Smith and Tim Davidson, all well-known local figures who have bettered the community through their time, talents, passion and concern for others.

The last time the Rotary Club selected a G.E. Meads Award winner was in 2012.

“It’s been a number of years,” Cloutier said. “It’s an award that we obviously don’t just arbitrarily hand out to anyone. It’s given to people who have gone above and beyond in the community.”

When the Rotarians were tossing around the names of potential recipients earlier this year, Cloutier said, “We kept coming back to Bill (Service).”

“Everybody who knows him knows what he’s about, what he represents and the things he does (for) the community,” he said.

“He’s just a genuinely kind person,” Cloutier noted.

Service has worked in the television industry for more than half a century.

He got his start back in 1963 as a part-time cameraman.

Over the years, he moved up the ladder. He worked as an engineer, as a director in both the Flint and Detroit markets and as a sales manager and station general manager for ABC and NBC affiliates in Lexington, Kentucky and Augusta, Georgia, respectively.

One of the highlights of Service’s TV career was producing a one-hour program about Roy and Patty Disney. It was entitled “Disney Continues” and in 1988, he received a National Association of Television Program Executives (NATPE) award for it. The award was presented by legendary entertainer Bob Hope.

Service retired in 2003, took a break from the small screen for about a year, then went to work part-time for OCTV.

He became station manager in 2013.

Under Service’s leadership, the station significantly upgraded its equipment, received numerous state and regional awards, and most importantly, greatly expanded its local coverage, programming and viewership.

He believes OCTV fills a definite need because it highlights all the things in the Oxford/Addison area that viewers will never see broadcast by the major Detroit stations.

“You’ve got to have local content,” Service said.

In addition to OCTV, Service, who served in the U.S. Air Force from 1959-63, has been an active member of American Legion Post 108 for a number of years.

He spent five years as the post commander, during which time he helped breathe new life into the organization, helping it to become more vital, relevant and involved in the community.

In recognition of his efforts, the American Legion Department of Michigan thrice awarded him the Andy Gomolak Flying Eagle Award for his public relations work.

The award recognizes the Legionnaire who does the best job promoting the local post’s programs and activities along with the Legion’s four pillars – veterans affairs and rehabilitation, national security, Americanism, and children and youth.

Service is looking forward to the April 24 Rotary luncheon and plans to bring OCTV Production Manager Teri Stiles as his guest.

“She’s my right-hand at the station,” he said.

He’s grateful to the Rotary Club for this accolade. “It’s a pretty neat group,” Service said.

Anyone wishing to attend the Rotary luncheon is asked to please provide advance notice by calling Cloutier at (248) 628-3034.

 

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