Jim Meacham has worn so many hats during his life that he’s incorporated them while leading the noon Rotary Club of Westerville meeting.
The third Thursday of each month, Meacham brings in a hat from one of the roles he’s played in the community as a “getting to know you” exercise along with two fellow Rotarians, who share more about themselves with the club.
Meacham is 2022-23 president of the noon Rotary. He was sworn in on July 1 after retiring in June from posts as command chaplain of the Westerville Division of Police and Westerville Division of Fire, chaplain of the Delaware County Sheriff’s office, and senior pastor of Grace Chapel Community Church.
He was the first chaplain to serve with the Westerville police and spent 50 years in a volunteer capacity while leading as pastor.
“That’s been my life,” Meacham says. “I’m honored to serve Westerville in that way.”
Meacham met his wife , Sandra, in the Newark High School band and dated her throughout college. They were married in 1966.
“During the time I was engaged to my wife, I felt the call to be a pastor,” he says. “I just felt the Lord was saying, you’re doing your music, that’s all right, but you will (be a pastor).”
He worked as band director at Johnstown Monroe High School before going full-time as pastor.
Meacham, who studied music at The Ohio State University, became the full-time pastor of Grace Chapel in 1972, and joined Rotary in 1973.
In 1972, a Westerville police officer who was a member of the church suggested that Meacham consider serving as chaplain for the department after hearing him talk about his desire to be a military chaplain at one point in his life.
The officer told him they didn’t have a chaplain and told him to talk to the chief. That meeting ended with the chief handing him the chaplain badge from his desk drawer.
“He said, ‘Here’s a badge. Welcome, chaplain,’” Meacham says.
Since then, Meacham has dedicated his life to service to his community as chaplain and community volunteer in Westerville and surrounding areas.
After his first call with the police force, in which officers were called to a barricade situation, he asked the chief if he could attend police school to get more training for the situations in which he would be embedded.
So in 1973, Meacham attended the Worthington Police Academy and became a reserve officer for the City of Westerville until 1983. Over 10 years, he worked up to the rank of sergeant.
Fun fact
Meacham played the sousaphone in The Ohio State University marching band and had the honor of dotting the I in Script Ohio, which is how his high school band director convinced him to switch from drums.
“Well, I’ll tell you what (the director said),” Meacham says. “‘Someday, you might dot the I in Script Ohio,’ and sure enough then, that was enough of a challenge that I started.”
“It helped me be chaplain,” he says. “(The police officers) always handled the legal side and I handled the emotional side.”
The next hurdle came following a fatal car crash with multiple people in need of emotional support. The experience made Meacham realize he couldn’t handle the duties of chaplain alone.
Meacham proposed expanding the chaplaincy to the chief, who gave him a year to put a program together.
“In one month, I had seven chaplains and we became a chaplains corps,” Meacham says.
He personally oversaw the training of the group, which was made up of clergy from Westerville.
Along the way, Meacham picked up more assignments, including at the Delaware County Sheriff’s office, which asked him to start a chaplains’ corps in 2008. He spent 14 years as chaplain in the sheriff’s office, eight of them at the jail.
During his years of chaplaincy, Meacham has been involved with such programs as Central Ohio Crime Stoppers’ Bless the Badge ceremony and its annual fundraising breakfast. He also taught classes for the Citizen Police Academy in Westerville.
“They call (my class) the crying class because all my stories are sad,” he says. “My wife said, ‘Honey, you’ve seen enough of that in 50 years.’”
Meacham’s service to his community continues with Rotary. He’s still involved in his church, but he has a new focal point this year as president. It’s his second stint in the presidency; he’s the only member to have been president twice.
He’s focused on building up membership numbers and being involved with projects such as establishing a Star House in Westerville.
“That’s kept me active, because I’m responsible and I try to go to all of those things,” Meacham says.
Meacham’s son, Doug, recently joined Rotary.
“One thing I know I’ve learned from dad is the importance of relationships,” says Doug, who now serves as pastor of Grace Chapel. “So much more can be accomplished when you have those connections.”
Meacham may be retired, but he still has plenty to give to the community.
“I’m 78 years old, I’m not done yet. Who knows what tomorrow holds?” he says. “God’s word says, here am I, send me. And I intend to do that.”
Meacham’s first stint as Rotary president was in 1977, following the passing of A. Monroe Courtright, publisher of The Public Opinion and charter member of the club. Meacham, the club’s president-elect at the time, served as one of his pallbearers at Courtright’s funeral.
Following his death, the club established the A. Monroe Courtright Volunteer Service Award for “significant and sustained” outstanding service in a volunteer capacity. And in 2018, Meacham won the award himself. That was the year two Westerville police officers were killed in the line of duty.
“That was the hardest thing I ever had to go through,” he says.
That same year, he was named Ohio Chaplain of the Year by the International Conference of Police Chaplains.
“I couldn’t have done this without them. I take this back to them,” he said of his fellow chaplains at the time. “It humbles you, because it’s not about me. I’ve always tried to make it not about me.”
Maisie Fitzmaurice is a contributing writer at CityScene Media Group. Feedback welcome at feedback@cityscenemediagroup.com.