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Bob Barrows
 
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Bob was born in LA just after Pearl Harbor.
 
The family stopped overnight in Steamboat on their move back to his parents home in Nebraska and they liked it so much decided to make it their home.
 
Bob had a horse that was mostly a pet.  Once he really had to go to the bathroom.  He rode the horse into the yard and flipped the reins over his sisters  playpen, one of the wooden ones with upright slats.  The horse spooked and took off with the playpen and his sister.  She was all right and Bob said his mother made sure he absorbed the pain of the event.
 
 
 
Bob enjoys skiing and had the steamboat runs to get good on.  
 (Bob has been the guru for our exchange students skiing.).
 
Bob went to CU and graduated from there in 1964. He married Johnna Beth who also grew up in Steamboat and went to CU.  They have been married 53 years.
 
Bob had learned to operate bulldozers.  He thought of it as a fall back position.  He got drafted and went to OCS in the Corp of Engineers.  He trained operators on Cat equipment and ordered a lot of Cat equipment for the army.
 
He worked for Cat in Peoria for a year before moving to Geneva, Switzerland for a time as an engineer, supporting Cat equipment.  Subsequently they moved to Stockholm, Sweden.  Their daughter was born there.  Their son Rob was born while they were in the Army.
 
Bob got a commercial pilot's license as one more fall-back position.
 
Bob became associated with Joe Wagner on Smith and Tower Road. It was one of  the biggest businesses  in Aurora in 1982.  They were looking to expand.  Cat said how about Outer Mongolia and later Siberia .  They also became a Ford and Land Rover dealer in Mongolia.  The equipment was being used in mining and the large Ford Excursions were used to transport personnel.  They subsequently sold out the Siberian dealership to a South African Cat dealer partner
 
Jerry Allen invited him to Rotary in 1992. He thought there were some good Aurora contacts here and joined.
 
After joining, he met Debbie Lynch who got him involved as Chairman of AEF and with Linda Bowman who helped start Wagner’s CCA Apprentice program.  The International Exchange program, the water projects, Polio Plus and other projects made him proud and excited to remain a Rotarian.
 
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