About Club 375 Jump To: History · Milestones · Mission Statement · 4-Way Test · Object of Rotary
Young attorney, Paul Harris, met with a coal dealer, a mining engineer and a tailor in Chicago, Illinois on February 23, 1905 and formed the first Rotary Club [so named because the meetings were held in ROTATION at the member's place of business].
A national Rotary organization was formed in Chicago in 1910 at a convention of the 16 clubs then in existence.
IN 1911, THE Rotary Club of Winnipeg, Canada was admitted to the organization and Rotary became INTERNATIONAL in scope at that time.
On April 1, 1918, the Lancaster Rotary Club became Club Number 375 with 25 charter members. We currently have 136 members. The Lancaster Club has been the sponsor of two Rotary Clubs, the Perry County Club in New Lexington in 1983 [now disbanded] and the Lancaster Sherman Club in 1985.
One cannot apply for membership in Rotary. You must be invited to become a member and you are "loaned" a classification which reflects your business or profession. Attendance at our weekly meetings is encouraged and expected.
We host an Annual Christmas Party for Forest Rose School at the Christmas season and host Rotary International Group Study Exchange teams from time to time.
Each year we host and help subsidize foreign exchange students who attend our local high schools. We also arrange for a number of local students to live abroad for a year to learn other cultures and improve international understanding. Our exchange student program ranks with the very best of Rotary Clubs. John Dye was the catalyst for this program and now Judy Root is continuing tat legacy of our exchange program.
We provided some funding and considerable manpower in 1992 for the Allen Chapel church restoration project.
We raised a considerable amount of money for Operation Smile, a Rotary District program involving volunteers repairing children's facial deformities. A team, including Robin Saum, a Lancaster Rotarian, went to Nicaragua in 1995 and 1996 to perform more than 250 surgeries. In 1998, the club raised over $3500.00 again for Operation Smile.
We raised nearly $5000.00 to build some lighted outdoor basketball courts at Lancaster High School in 1993 as a memorial to deceased Lancaster School Superintendent and Rotarian Robert Speith.
Our members committed to contributions of more than $70,000 beginning in 1988 to a PolioPlus Program which is intended to immunize all children worldwide by no later than Rotary's 100th anniversary in 2005. This is but one of the Rotary Foundation's worthwhile projects of scholarships, group study exchange, Preserve Planet Earth and grants for International Health, Hunger and Humanity.
We have our own Lancaster Rotary Foundation which is now combined with the Fairfield County Foundation for efficiency in investing and administering its numerous programs. Through two major auctions, contributions and bequests, the Lancaster Rotary Foundation has accumulated monies for a variety of scholarship funds. A recognition luncheon is presented in May of each year to honor those students who receive monies from the Foundation.
We had another major fund raising project in 1994 under the leadership of Paul Dunphy and Milton Taylor to finance the improving of Literacy in Fairfield County which generated $70,000.
The Lancaster Rotary Club is busy in the community but you don't hear a lot about the club's activities all the time. But our membership is always heavily involved in every aspect of community service as officers and members of the board of many organizations throughout the community. If it's good for the community, you will always find Rotarians in leadership roles.
The mission of Rotary International is to support its member clubs in fulfilling the Object of Rotary by:
From the earliest days of the organization, Rotarians were concerned with promoting high ethical standards in their professional lives. One of the world's most widely printed and quoted statements of business ethics is The 4-Way Test, which was created in 1932 by Rotarian Herbert J. Taylor (who later served as RI president) when he was asked to take charge of a company that was facing bankruptcy. This 24-word code of ethics for employees to follow in their business and professional lives became the guide for sales, production, advertising, and all relations with dealers and customers, and the survival of the company is credited to this simple philosophy. Adopted by Rotary in 1943, The 4-Way Test has been translated into more than a hundred languages and published in thousands of ways. It asks the following four questions:
"Of the things we think, say or do:
Is it the TRUTH?
Is it FAIR to all concerned?
Will it build GOODWILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS?
Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned?"
The Object of Rotary is to encourage and foster the ideal of service as a basis of worthy enterprise and, in particular, to encourage and foster:
FIRST. The development of acquaintance as an opportunity for service;
SECOND. High ethical standards in business and professions, the recognition of the worthiness of all useful occupations, and the dignifying of each Rotarian's occupation as an opportunity to serve society;
THIRD. The application of the ideal of service in each Rotarian's personal, business, and community life;
FOURTH. The advancement of international understanding, goodwill, and peace through a world fellowship of business and professional persons united in the ideal of service.
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