Rotary International
About Rotary
Rotary is an international membership organization for service. People of different professions and backgrounds meet in a club and take on work at home and around the world.
What is Rotary?
Rotary International is a nongovernmental organization. It is not a rescue service that arrives first at a disaster, as the Red Cross or Médecins Sans Frontières does. Members form clubs, and clubs join a district and Rotary International. Lions and Kiwanis are the same kind of membership organization. Not every nonprofit works this way.
As small gears mesh to lift a heavy load, ordinary people gather and do an uncommon thing.
Before we think, speak, or act, we ask whether it is true, fair to everyone, likely to build goodwill and friendship, and beneficial to all. We do not put politics or religion forward, and we welcome members of different cultures and backgrounds.
There are now more than 46,000 clubs in some 200 countries, and between 1.2 and 1.4 million members. Korea has Zones 11 and 12, 19 districts, about 1,600 clubs, and 62,000 to 65,000 members. The Rotary Club of Busan is in District 3661, which has about 60 clubs and some 2,700 members.
The club’s work is shared by the president, president-elect, vice president, secretary, treasurer, and five committees: membership, public image, The Rotary Foundation, club administration, and service projects. An office is a way to divide the work. Members are equal.
Two mottoes
Service Above Self
Service Above Self. One Profits Most Who Serves Best. This is not a religious doctrine. Like the old village compacts, it is a promise that when people help one another, everyone is better off.
Seven areas of focus
People in business, the professions, and civic life meet in a club and look at what is near and what is far. Rotary International divides that work into seven causes.
- 01PeaceEase conflict, and give people who differ a reason to sit at the same table.
- 02Disease prevention and treatmentLook first where prevention has not yet reached. Polio is the longest chapter of that work.
- 03Water and sanitationCarry the work forward until clean water and sanitation are part of everyday life.
- 04Maternal and child healthProtect the health of mothers and children through local and international cooperation.
- 05Basic education and literacyOpen the chance to learn and to read, so the next generation can stand on its own.
- 06Community economic developmentHelp neighbors build livelihoods and learning that last.
- 07The environmentCare for the place we use now, so the next person can inherit it.
Chicago, 1905
On 23 February 1905, Paul Harris, a lawyer, Gustavus Loehr, a mining engineer, Sylvester Schiele, a coal merchant, and Hiram Shorey, a tailor, held the first meeting in Chicago. Harris was not trying to found a grand institution. He wanted people of different professions to share ideas and friendship, and to know one another as in the town of his childhood.
The name Rotary came from meeting in turn at members’ offices. On 15 August 1910 the first convention met at the Congress Hotel in Chicago, and Paul Harris became the first president. That first circle was small. Rotary has since opened it to members of different cultures and backgrounds. Kiwanis followed in 1915, and Lions in 1917.
The emblem began in 1905 as a wagon wheel, drawn by Montague M. Bear, a Chicago member and sculptor. It stood for civilization and movement. In 1920 the engineer Oscar Bjorge redrew it as a gear, and in 1923 it became the official emblem. Twenty-four teeth are the hours of a day: service does not sleep. Six spokes were the six Objects of Rotary at the time. The keyway in the center is the member who turns the wheel. Royal blue and gold, chosen in 1929, stand for integrity, a high ethic, and a standard that travels.
Polio is work led by a service organization, not by one country. In 1979 the first project immunized six million children in the Philippines. PolioPlus began in 1985, and in 1988 Rotary joined the World Health Organization and UNICEF in the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. Members have given more than 2.1 billion dollars and millions of hours, helping immunize some three billion children in 122 countries. 99.9 percent of polio has disappeared. It remains endemic in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
In 1955 Jonas Salk made a vaccine and did not patent it. He asked, “Could you patent the sun?” Because of that choice, the vaccine could be supplied at very low cost. Albert Sabin’s oral vaccine made PolioPlus possible in 1985. World Polio Day is 24 October.
“Rotary means a great deal to us, but the world will come to know Rotary through what we achieve.”
A promise carried forward
Rotary was international from the start, met again after war had pulled it apart, and stayed with long work such as polio. The Rotary Club of Busan is where that promise reached this city.
First
Within sixteen years of the founding, there were clubs on six continents. There are now more than 46,000 clubs in some 200 countries. Winston Churchill, Walt Disney, Neil Armstrong, Thomas Edison, Sam Walton, and Harland Sanders were among the members.
Second
During the Second World War, clubs in Germany, Austria, Italy, Spain, Japan, and elsewhere had to disband. Members kept meeting informally through the danger, and after the war they rebuilt clubs and cities.
Third
It began with six million children in the Philippines in 1979. PolioPlus followed in 1985, and in 1988 the initiative with the World Health Organization and UNICEF. Polio, endemic in 125 countries in 1988, now remains endemic only in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Fourth
The Rotary Club of Busan is the second club in Korea. It was formed on 28 February 1935 and chartered by Rotary International on 15 May as club number 2802. After the Korean War the Pyongyang club was gone. The twelve clubs that remained, with 682 members, opened independent District 375 on 1 July 1961.
Fifth
Scholarships after the Korean War reached war orphans and students in hard circumstances. From 1993 to 2018 the club supported the Aloysius High School orchestra, and in 2026 it is joining the Sisters of Mary again in care for older people. Seven hundred trees in front of Beomeosa, and part of the grounds at the UN Memorial Cemetery in Yongho-dong, Nam-gu, are also this club’s work.
- 46,000+