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 This is the page where our
research project began. On Wednesday 11 October 2000,
Jack M. B. Selway, then a
member of
Rotary Club of Pueblo, CO #43, received a list of the
first 50 Rotary clubs. This list was faxed to Selway by RI staff member,
Joaquín Mejía.
It was the only list which could be found and was from an old
fashioned typewriter. (seen on the left) Within a few days Selway had
created a
page for each club telling where they were located, when they
met, maybe something about their communities. Then Founder Selway had the thought that
perhaps their histories might be of some interest... From then on,
volunteer Rotarians around the world worked on hundreds of projects: |
Stories about all the presidents, first clubs of
every country, early clubs of every continent, the philosophy of
Rotary, the story of Women and Rotary and the list goes on.
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Within a few weeks of our founding the project became
"Rotary First Fifty" with the authorized domain of
www.rotaryfirstfifty.org
still used to reach this page. |
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But here you can learn about the first nine years.
From 1905 until 1914 -- 100 Rotary clubs joined together to form this marvelous
organization. By studying these clubs, you'll find common goals,
lasting values, traditions, abilities to adapt and great Rotarians.
What is remarkable is that these 100 clubs are
"the" original "First 100 Clubs" of Rotary. Not one of them failed.
They are in five countries. They've weathered two world wars. Some
had war in their streets and there were awful financial times. They are still here. Enjoy meeting them as
we continue to discover them ourselves.
One of the objectives Rotary Global History was to cover the history of Rotary's early years. We chose the
"First 100 Clubs" and were authorized to use
www.rotaryfirst100.org,
as a number during the centennial of Rotary International. For reasons satisfied by the Four Way Test, we added
five clubs, all of which could have
been number one-hundred. We also added
eight clubs mentioned in the
"1905-1948"
appendix
found in the first edition of
"My Road to Rotary" by Paul P. Harris and published by A. Kroch and Son. The
result is a study of one-hundred and thirteen clubs which cover the entire
Rotary
life of Rotary's founder
Paul Harris.
Historians, around the world, continue to maintain and improve this archive of
Rotary's history.
RotaryFirst100 - Rotary's First 100 Years
A doctoral thesis, detailed history of Rotary and civic
internationalism
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