How Singing came to Rotary, and Off-Color Jokes did not! Almost everyone who is a member of a Rotary club for more than a year knows that Rotary member No. 5, Chicago printer Harry Ruggles, brought singing to Rotary meetings. What almost no one knows is why, and most don’t know how important it was to

the life of Rotary.

Harry Ruggles was a very moral man. He detested off-color language, malicious innuendo and classless humor. He argued in club meetings for clean language. Little more than a year after Rotary had been formed, at an evening meeting in 1906, the guest speaker began a story. Having heard it before, Harry also had heard the off-color ending, and felt it was inappropriate for the club, so he

jumped up in the middle of the joke and yelled, “Come on boys, let's sing!” He then led the club in the singing of “Let Me Call You Sweetheart.”

This was not only the first time that members had ever sung in Rotary, but apparently, also the first time that a group of businessmen ever sang at a business meeting, anywhere. By his surprising actions at this evening meeting, Harry demonstrated that demeaning activities and off-color stories were not welcome at Rotary gatherings. “It was reported at the time that the would-be speaker was embarrassed and sore,” and so Harry Ruggles apologized, but the club backed him up. Right then and there, it was decided that all subsequent Rotary meetings should be conducted so that any woman could attend without being embarrassed. This has been the unwritten rule ever since, just as the tradition of singing has endured.