What is Rotary?
Rotary is an organization of business and professional leaders united worldwide, who provide humanitarian service, encourage high ethical standards in all vocations, and help build goodwill and peace in the world.

There are approximately 1.222 million Rotarians, members of more than 32,596 Rotary clubs in 529 districts in 168 countries. (July 31, 2006)

Under the auspices of Rotary International and The Rotary Foundation, Rotarians around the world participate in and administer a broad range of humanitarian and educational programs and activities designed to improve the human condition and advance the organization's ultimate goal of world understanding and peace.

For more information about the Rotary Club of Welland, check out our brochure.

Rotary Beginnings...
February 23, 1905. The airplane had yet to stay aloft more than a few minutes. The first motion picture theater had not yet opened. Norway and Sweden were peacefully terminating their union. On this particular day, a Chicago lawyer, Paul P. Harris, called three friends to a meeting. What he had in mind was a club that would kindle fellowship among members of the business community. It was an idea that grew from his desire to find within the large city the kind of friendly spirit that he knew in the villages where he had grown up.

The four businessmen didn't decide then and there to call themselves a Rotary club, but their get-together was, in fact, the first meeting of the world's first Rotary club. As they continued to meet, adding others to the group, they rotated their meetings among the members' places of business, hence the name. Soon after the club name was agreed upon, one of the new members suggested a wagon wheel design as the club emblem. It was the precursor of the familiar cogwheel emblem now worn by Rotarians around the world. By the end of 1905, the club had 30 members.

The second Rotary club was formed in 1908 half a continent away from Chicago in San Francisco, California. It was a much shorter leap across San Francisco Bay to Oakland, California, where the third club was formed. Others followed in Seattle, Washington, Los Angeles, California, and New York City, New York. Rotary became international in 1910 when a club was formed in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. By 1921 the organization was represented on every continent, and the name Rotary International was adopted in 1922.

Object of Rotary
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.

The Declaration of Rotarians in Businesses and Professions was adopted by the Rotary International Council on Legislation in 1989 to provide more specific guidelines for the high ethical standards called for in the Object of Rotary:

As a Rotarian engaged in a business or profession, I am expected to:

• Consider my vocation to be another opportunity to serve;
• Be faithful to the letter and to the spirit of the ethical codes of my vocation, to the laws of my country, and to the moral standards of my community;
• Do all in my power to dignify my vocation and to promote the highest ethical standards in my chosen vocation;
• Be fair to my employer, employees, associates, competitors, customers, the public and all those with whom I have a business or professional relationship;
• Recognize the honor and respect due to all occupations which are useful to society;
• Offer my vocational talents: to provide opportunities for young people, to work for the relief of the special needs of others, and to improve the quality of life in my community;
• Adhere to honesty in my advertising and in all representations to the public concerning my business or profession;
• Neither seek from nor grant to a fellow Rotarian a privilege or advantage not normally accorded others in a business or professional relationship.

Mission Statement:
The main objective of Rotary is service - in the community, the workplace, and throughout the world. Rotarians foster and encourage the ideal of "service above self" through the betterment of business and professional ethics, promote international understanding and goodwill, and provide humanitarian service.

Rotary International has a decentralized structure, with local clubs that are autonomous and community-based. Each service club works to improve the quality of life at home and around the world.

Rotary members have the collective expertise and skills to implement dynamic and sustainable programs in the areas of hunger, poverty, and illiteracy, with particular emphasis on children, the aging, and the disabled.

Four Way Test:
The 4-Way Test was adopted by Rotary in 1943 and has been translated into more than a hundred languages and published in thousands of ways...

"Of the things we think, say or do:

1. Is it the truth?
2. Is it fair to all concerned?
3. Will it build goodwill and better friendships?
4. Will it be beneficial to all concerned?"