History:

When you look at the Around Town section in our paper you notice that we have a large number of groups more than willing to help out in the community. Recently I discovered that one of the groups, the Rotary, is celebrating their 60th anniversary this year and the international organization is celebrating their centennial. Attorney Paul Harris of Chicago started Rotary International. He wished to promote the friendly spirit of the small town he grew up in. He started the Rotary on February 23, 1905. The first Rotary club met in a number of members' offices so the meeting place was rotated hence the name "Rotary". The fledgling group quickly gained membership and new clubs. By 1921 six countries had Rotary clubs hence the name of the club was changed to Rotary International.

Our local club got started in the optimistic times at the end of World War II. There were probably other preliminary meetings but the first full meeting that made it into the Press Dispatch was a provisional meeting held on April 26, 1945. The first president of the meeting was Ward Evans, a local attorney. They had a speaker from the international organization that spoke on the purpose and aims of Rotary International. Their meeting place was one they would use, and a number of other service groups, for a number of years: the coffee shop at the Beacon Hotel.

The new club must have impressed the national group because on May 31, 1945 our local group had their official charter and were ready to go. Besides Evans being President, Ralph D. Strength, officer of the local Bank of America Branch, was elected secretary. One of the traditions of Rotary is to have just one representative for one type of business. So if there is a lawyer in the local club there can be no other lawyers until the original lawyer retires from the club. This allows the club to have many diverse resources and knowledge. The charter members of the club were definitely diverse representing such a spread of occupations from A.H. Painter, managing editor of the Press Dispatch to Jack Cartwright who ran the local billiard hall.

Our Rotary did not sit around too long before going into action. On June 28, 1945 it was announced that two new Rotary committees were formed. One was a sign committee that was tasked to work with the other service groups in town to erect welcome signs, with logos of all the groups, on all the roads into town. The other committee was a publicity committee. When I first read the name of this committee I thought that their job would be to promote the Rotary in our area. Not so, they had bigger ideas. Their task was to promote the "Barstow Trading Area to the World."

On June 22, a new job for the Rotary was started; a Veterans and Servicemen's Council. The council's job was very timely, their aim was to find jobs for servicemen coming back from the war and to help re-establish them into civilian life. Head of this committee was "Pat" Patterson. Patterson had worked at the Douglas Aircraft Center at the Daggett Airport in their human resources department.

Barstow Rotary has continued thorough our history to be an active group. Barstow is a greener place because of them. When the hospital was built in 1957 and 1958 the Rotary did their landscaping. They also did the original landscaping in front of city hall. They also built horseshoe pits in Stringham Park and a number of other parks in town. In 1986 they actually built a park. For the Barstow centennial the Rotary built Centennial Park on the corner of Barstow Road and Virginia Way. Across the street they helped start the Mojave River Valley Museum.

Today Barstow's Rotary has many projects going. They sponsor sports teams, Boy and Girl Scouts and Toy for Tots. They also helped with the recent Kid's Care Fair. One of my favorite projects is the Dictionary Project. They gave every third grader in Barstow a dictionary in the fall of 2004. They will continue giving out dictionaries during the first week of November this year. This is only a small list of the many projects Rotary has done in our past and in the present. To list them would take up too much space. To celebrate the Centennial of Rotary International each chapter has been challenged to complete a centennial project. Our Rotary has chosen to build a great looking community gateway sign at Centennial Park (how fitting).