The Rotary Club of Salt Lake had its beginnings in January 1911, a little more than five years after the first Rotary Club was organized in Chicago in 1905.  It grew out of a conversation in Chicago between Wesley King of the National Copper Bank of Salt Lake and his Spanish-American war buddy, Chesley Perry, who joined the Rotary Club of Chicago in 1908 and became the first secretary of the National Association of Rotary Clubs, eventually Rotary International where Perry served until 1942. Perry was the first member of the Chicago club to join Paul Harris in his concept of "Around the World" Rotary. 

After his return from his visit with Perry, Wesley discussed the idea with several prominent Salt Lake men.  Then, assuming this was the way to get a group started, Wes and Joy Johnson, president of the Salt Lake Commercial Club, chose a group of fifteen to become charter members.  They then wrote to the “Mother Club’ in Chicago for instructions.  The answer was troubling–there were two rules which the group could not meet.  First the host city had to have a population of 100,000, and according to the 1910 census, Salt Lake fell short by 7,500.  Wesley and Joy finally persuaded Salt Lake’s mayor, John S Bransford, to sign an affidavit that the city’s population was continuing to grow and at the time of writing was easily more than 100,000.  

The second condition was that three existing clubs had to endorse the application.  This proved to be impossible.  Rotary then had only twenty-three clubs, the nearest being three on the Pacific Coast.  Two of the three clubs (san Francisco and Oakland), upon being approached, refused approval!  For many years Salt Lake City had included two communities–a community of Latter-day Saints and a community of non–Latter-day Saints.  Each group distrusted the other and strove for dominance. 

This did not bode well, thought members of the two West Coast clubs, for the bond of brotherhood required by Rotary.  The two clubs demanded that the Salt Lake club be formed entirely of Mormons or non-Mormons.  “Those were the days,” wrote Wes King, “when the Salt Lake Tribune and the Deseret News made faces at each other every day.  Most everyday, the editorial writer for the Tribune chewed up a Mormon and spit him out the window, and that evening the Deseret News massacred a Gentile....”

At this juncture Joy Johnson, as president of the Commercial Club, took steps to “melt the ice barrier which clearly divided this fine community into two camps” by inviting the owner of each newspaper and magazine in Salt Lake, church leaders, bankers, business and professional men, and civic leaders to be his guests at luncheon at the Commercial Club.  The situation was explained to the group.  Wesley King later described what Joy Johnson then did:

He boldly locked the dining room doors and announced that he would “only unlock them when an agreement was reached looking toward a condition of amity in this community.”  That started the melting of the ice.  It took the vitriol out of future newspaper editorials.  Armed with proof of these facts, Joy went to the West Coast and came back with the coved letters of approval for the organization of our new amazing Club.  Filled with excitement, we held our first meeting the evening of January 31, 1911.  

That first meeting was held in Room 508 of the Boston Building, then part of the office of Gustin, Gillette, Davis & Brayton.  There the enthusiastic organizers formed the Rotary Club of Salt Lake City.  We can all be proud that Rotary played a major role in initiating the pattern of cooperation that has characterized Salt Lake City from that day to this.