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Paul P. Harris the founder of Rotary was
born at Racine, Wisconsin , U.S.A. on April19,1868.When he was three
years old he was taken to Walling ford, Vermont, to live with his
paternal grand parents. The back river academy at Ludlow, Vermont &
Vermont Academy at sax tons river prepared him for his studies at the
university of Vermont, Princeton university and the University of Luwa.
Following his graduation from the law school of the university of Luwa
in 1891,he spent the next five years in seeing the world and in coming
to know his fellow men before setting down to practice law in Chicago. He worked as a newspaper reporter a
business college teacher, a stock company actor, as a cow boy and a
sales man for a marble and granite concern, before finally setting in
Chicago as lawyer in 1896.In July 1910, he married Jean Thomson, a
Scottish girl and a co- member in Chicago prairie club.
He was the first chairman of the board of
the national society for crippled children and adults in the U.S.A. and
of the international society for crippled children. He was awarded
Honorary PhD in 1933 by the university of Vermont. Elected president
Emeritus of rotary international 1912,he was acting in rotary until his
death on January 27th, 1947.Since 1905, the ideas of Paul Harris and his
friends have become ideals which have been accepted by people of
practically all nationalities, and of many political religious believes.
Today there are rotary clubs in Austria and America Samoa, in Brazil and
Brunei, in India and Italy, in Russia and Poland, in Scotland and South
Africa-in some 176 countries and geographical regions. The universal;
Acceptance of rotary principles ha s been so great that there are now
more than 25,000 Rotary clubs, which have a membership of over
1,100,000,in 501 districts.
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R.J.Coombes, the manager of a steel products company in
Calcutta was on a business trip to U.S.A. There he got interested in the
rotary movement and was impressed with the 'friendship fellowship,
service. After his return to India in 1919,he organized a rotary club in
Calcutta. The first meeting was held on 26th September 199,and the club
was granted charted on January1, 1920 with an initial membership which
was extended in 1921 by Sir Surendranath Banerjee. In the same year,
S.C. Rudra was admitted as the first active Indian member with the
classification 'Mining Engineering. In 1926 and India honorary secretary
was elected in the person of Nitish. C. Laharry. Finally, an Indian,
A.F.M. Abdul Ali, was elected president, the first Indian to head a
Rotary Club anywhere.
Jim
Davison launched the Rotary club of Bombay. Was added on
19th march 1929. With a charter strength of 38 members of
whom 37 were non- Indians and the one and the only Indian was Sir
Phiroze Sethna, a member of Indian Legislature, who later became the
District Governor. Jim organized a pleasant group of 28 at Maiden’s
Hotel Delhi on 26th April 1929. R.T.H. Mackenzie Manager of the Burma
Shell Oil Company, a British was elected president. Even before the club
got under way, members began leaving town. With departures on long leave
the membership dwindled to half and finally the club had to be closed
down in 1931.
In Madras Jim Davidson with the help of F.C.
James of the United Platters Association of South India organized
meeting on May 10.1929 with 30 charter members all non- Indians. The
first president was C.G. Armstrong; Chairman of the Madras Port Trust.
And the first Secretary was Morton Chance manager of a Hotel chain in
Madras. A.A. Hayles Former Editor of The Mail was a chartered Member.
During the first year itself a few distinguished Indians joined the club
of Whom Raja Sir M.A. Muthiah Chettiar was Madras
sponsored. Nilgiris club which in turn sponsored Coimbatore club. Most
of the clubs in South
India are either the children of grand children or great grant children
of the Madras Club.
The growth has been slow, perhaps due the reason that, India at that
time was base essentially on agricultural economy while the
framework of Rotary membership was based upon industrial
and professional structure of society. Gradually as India emerged
to an economy issued on modern industrialization, extension of Rotary
become possible. Rotary
Club of Amritsar was born in 1933 and that of
Bangalore in
1934.In 1935 five clubs were
formed: Ahmedabad, Baroda, Jamshedpur, Poona and Sholapur all
fast developing industrial centers producing textiles, chemicals and
iron & steel. Three
clubs namely Cochin, Lucknow and Surat were established in 1927. Rotary
Club of Cochin, the only club in Kerala, was chartered on 23rd
August 1927 with Sir R.K. Shanmugam Chetty as President.
Of the 22 charter members, 10 were non- Indians. Another three
Clubs Asansol, Madurai and
Rajkot came into existence in 1938, and Agra, Salem and Jabalpur in
1939. Delhi club also was revived in 1939. After the world War II
and India's
independence in
1947, the
real Indianization of Rotary
started, By the
end of
Rotary year
1946-47 there
were 71
clubs (14 in
Gujarat,10 in
Maharashtra, 10 in
up, 7
in Tamilnadu,7 in
Karnataka and
23 in another
10 States with
a total membership
of 3, 121
in 7
Districts as
against 6
clubs with
235 Members in
1929-30 in one
provisional district
the District
A comprising of India,
Burma and Ceylon.
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