|
Scroll down
below for the history of the Milledgeville Club
The world's
first service club, the Rotary Club of Chicago, Illinois,
USA, was formed on 23 February 1905 by Paul P. Harris, an
attorney who wished to recapture in a professional club
the same friendly spirit he had felt in the small towns of
his youth. The name "Rotary" derived from the early
practice of rotating meetings among members' offices.
Rotary's
popularity spread throughout the United States in the
decade that followed; clubs were chartered from San
Francisco to New York. By 1921, Rotary clubs had been
formed on six continents, and the organization adopted the
name Rotary International a year later.
As
Rotary grew, its mission expanded beyond serving the
professional and social interests of club members.
Rotarians began pooling their resources and contributing
their talents to help serve communities in need. The
organization's dedication to this ideal is best expressed
in its principal motto: Service Above Self. Rotary also
later embraced a code of ethics, called The 4-Way Test,
that has been translated into hundreds of languages.
During
and after World War II, Rotarians became increasingly
involved in promoting international understanding. A
Rotary conference held in London in 1942 planted the seeds
for the development of the United Nations Educational,
Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and
numerous Rotarians have served as consultants to the
United Nations.
An
endowment fund, set up by Rotarians in 1917 "for doing
good in the world," became a not-for-profit corporation
known as
The Rotary Foundation in
1928. Upon the death of Paul Harris in 1947, an outpouring
of Rotarian donations made in his honor, totaling US$2
million, launched the Foundation's first program —
graduate fellowships, now called
Ambassadorial Scholarships.
Today, contributions to The Rotary Foundation total more
than US$80 million annually and support a wide range of
humanitarian grants and
educational programs that
enable Rotarians to bring hope and promote international
understanding throughout the world.
In 1985,
Rotary made a historic commitment to immunize all of the
world's children against polio. Working in partnership
with nongovernmental organizations and national
governments thorough its
PolioPlus program, Rotary
is the largest private-sector contributor to the global
polio eradication campaign. Rotarians have mobilized
hundreds of thousands of PolioPlus volunteers and have
immunized more than one billion children worldwide. By the
2005 target date for certification of a polio-free world,
Rotary will have contributed half a billion dollars to the
cause.
As it
approached the dawn of the 21st century, Rotary worked to
meet the changing needs of society, expanding its service
effort to address such pressing issues as environmental
degradation, illiteracy, world hunger, and children at
risk. The organization admitted women for the first time
in 1989 and claims more than 90,000 women in its ranks
today. Following the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the
dissolution of the Soviet Union, Rotary clubs were formed
or re-established throughout Central and Eastern Europe.
Today, 1.2 million Rotarians belong to some 30,000 Rotary
clubs in more than 160 countries.
http://www.rotary.org
Rotary Facts
History of the Rotary Club
of Milledgeville
(1937-2008)
The Milledgeville
Rotary Club was chartered on November 12, 1937 under the
leadership of Porter Carswell, PDG and PD of RI, and
member of the Rotary Club of Waynesboro, Georgia. Porter
spoke to our 40th Anniversary celebration in 1977 and told
the story of how he and charter member A. C. McKinley sat
down on the front porch and selected a group of
Milledgeville men to be charter members. Porter, who died
in late 1986, was something of a missionary for Rotary in
Georgia. He organized more than a dozen clubs in Georgia
and a couple in other states. He was a personal friend of
Paul Harris and hosted him on a whirlwind tour of a number
of clubs in the area including Milledgeville on a
non-Rotary day.
In 1937, Rotary
was 32 years old and had more than 4300 clubs in five
continents with a world total of more than 183,000
members. The Milledgeville charter group consisted of
twenty-nine business and professional men who banded
together to place Milledgeville, Georgia, USA among the
spots on the globe in which men embraced the ideals and
spirit of service exemplified by this rapidly expanding
organization. Maurice Duberry of France was then RI
president and J. Cleve Cooper, Clerk of Baldwin Superior
Court, was the charter president of the club. In that year
Rotary entered four new countries – what are now
Bangladesh, the Sudan, Syria and Venezuela. We were
approaching World War II and clubs were forced to disband
in Germany, Austria, and Italy. At the charter night
ceremonies on that November 12, over two hundred guests
from Rotary Clubs all over Georgia were present including
DG T. T. Molner and PDG Joel Chandler Harris, Jr. of
Atlanta. DG T. T. Molner and Porter Carswell came back in
1954-55 to re-present the charter, a ceremony conducted in
many clubs to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Rotary.
Porter also came back as the principal speaker at our 40th
Anniversary celebration in 1977.
On September 28,
1987, under the leadership of President Brad Oliver,
Milledgeville Rotary celebrated its 50th Anniversary with
R. I. President Charles C. Keller as the featured speaker.
This was a magnificent event with our sole surviving
charter member, Tom Hall Smith, present. DG Mansfield
Jennings, seven PDG's and many representatives from other
Georgia Rotary clubs attended. This event duplicated the
charter meeting of fifty years earlier including the
reception in the old Governors Mansion.
Milledgeville
Rotary has from the very beginning been active in Rotary
activities beyond the local club. In the summer of 1938,
Milledgeville hosted the three-day Rotary District
Conference which then encompassed the entire state. In
1944 member Guy Wells served as District Governor and in
1985-1986 R. Linton Cox, Jr. served as District Governor.
Several members have served as DG representatives and,
under the current district structure; Sam Watson served as
Assistant Governor. John Cooper served over 10 years as
District Conference Registrar leading the District into
the computer age. Milledgeville is proud of its long
history in the Georgia Rotary Student Program (GRSP) and
its part in developing the program during its early years.
Guy Wells, President of GSCW (now GC&SU) was an early
adviser and Salvo Mangiafico, the chairman of the Language
Department at GC&SU, was an early trustee of the program
who developed here a multi-week intense English study
program for early students who needed further English
training to manage courses conducted in English in Georgia
colleges and universities. Because of the facilities at
Georgia College, our community has hosted more GRSP
conclaves than any other Georgia Rotary city. Now
conclaves are rotated among the three districts and the
last conclave hosted by Milledgeville Rotary was in 1988.
Other Milledgeville Rotarians who have served in GRSP as
Trustees include Salvo Mangiafico, Joe Specht, first Dean
of GC&SU Business School, Randolph Puckett, Linton Cox,
Jr., Ed Hall, who served a number of years as District
Chairman, and current Line Trustee, Brad Serf. Our club
has sponsored or co-sponsored more than 46 international
students during the 59 year history of that program.
In 1945, under the
leadership of Walter B. Williams, Jr., Milledgeville was
the sponsor of the new Rotary club in Sandersville and in
1992, under the leadership of Brad Oliver; the
Milledgeville Antebellum Club was organized but
surrendered its charter seven years later. Our charter
membership of 29 had grown to 58 strong by 1957 and in
1967 we reached 82 members and were at 98 members in 1977.
Prior to the establishment of the Milledgeville Antebellum
Club, the Milledgeville Club reached a high point of 115
members. Today we have 103 members including two, George
Clark and Lee Davis who have been Rotarians over 50 years
and 6 new members joining us since July 1, 2005.
Community service
has been strong in the Milledgeville Club since the
beginning. The first major project was the "Pilgrimage
Project" which involved inviting out of town guests to
come and tour historic Milledgeville homes with the funds
received going partially to Rotary and partially to the
UDC and to the Governor's Mansion restoration fund. In
1944, the first Boy Scout meeting hall in the community
was constructed and Rotary sponsored Scout Troup 113 there
for many years. In 1960 Troup 110 was sponsored by Rotary
and its sponsorship continued until the late 60's. From
the early 1940s to the present date the Rotary Club has
sponsored scholarships for students attending GC&SU, GMC,
and the local Technical College. In the 1960s the club
established a revolving loan fund to assist students in an
LPN training program which was developed by then Baldwin
County Hospital. This program continued for many years and
the resulting funds were eventually turned over to the
hospital for future administration. Another significant
project was the construction in 1990 during the presidency
of Larry Peevy of a walking track at Walter B. Williams,
Jr. Recreational Complex at a cost of over $5000.00.
The club still maintains the track. The first Rotary Peace
Monument in the U. S. was erected at the new Baldwin
County Court House and dedicated on July 18, 1996 under
the chairmanship of Brad Oliver and President Sam Watson.
Annually since its dedication, Milledgeville Rotary hosts
in February each year a community Peace Day celebration at
the site of the monument. On February 23, 2005, we
celebrated the RI 100th Anniversary at the Peace Monument.
In the 2004-2005 Rotary year we contributed over
$18,000.00 to furnish and equip an emergency room suite at
Oconee Regional Hospital under the leadership of President
Fred Van Horn using funds accumulated over the past few
years for a “major community project".
Other traditional
annual projects include Shadow Day when Rotarians host in
their businesses high school juniors and seniors for a
morning to learn about careers; sponsorship of students
from local high schools to the RYLA program in Douglas,
Georgia; the District Speech Contest with participants
from the three local high schools; distribution of over
125 Christmas baskets to persons with special needs and to
spouses of deceased Rotarians. Club members also
participate in Christmas Season Salvation Army Bell
Ringing. For many years we have provided the welcome signs
on major incoming highways that announce the civic clubs
that have homes in Milledgeville and in 2005 those signs
were replaced with wood columned signs. Milledgeville
Rotary has been active in the international service area.
Three club sponsored students have been selected for
Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarships, including
Ann Wells in the 40s, Emily Trapnal in the 60s and Claire
Booth in the 70s. In 1985 Brad Oliver was selected to lead
one of the earlier Group Study Exchange Teams to Australia
and later our club assisted in hosting the Australian team
on their reciprocal visit to the district. Through
Rotarian Clyde Keeler's lifetime interest and dedicated
work with the Cuna Indians of San Blas Island, Panama, and
our club provided medical supplies and educational
materials to a clinic serving them.
Since the mid 70's
we have held an Annual Rotary Auction whose proceeds have
annually funded our support to more than 20 local
charitable projects and agencies. Since 2000 we have
provided over $150,000 in local community support.
In addition, our
club has been very supportive to the Rotary Foundation
with over 44 Paul Harris Fellows and supportive of the
GRSP endowment with over 23 Will Watt Fellows/Hue Thomas
Fellows.
At 71 years old (1937-2006), under
the leadership of current President Karen Brooks,
the Milledgeville Rotary Club continues to grow and thrive
inspired by the founding vision of Paul Harris and the
sense of fellowship and purpose that resides in our own
club. Karen Brooks is the first female president for the
Milledgeville Rotary Club.
At the 2008 Rotary Club’s
District 6920 Conference held in Macon recently, the
Milledgeville Club walked away with several awards:
Best
Web Page - 1st Place
Best Club Bulletin - Runner Up
Best Online Bulletin - 1st Place
Community Service Award - Runner Up
Best Club Scrapbook - Runner Up
Presidential Citation
Archive of weekly
bulletins for Milledgeville Club
Group photo
taken of Past Rotary Presidents
December 9, 2004
|
