The Lakeland South Rotary Club is a
group of over 60 young professionals, business executives, and
retired men and women who are dedicated to making Lakeland a
better place to live, work, and play. The club was chartered
in 1968 and has a long history of civic involvement,
leadership, and charitable giving. The club is proud to have
given over one million dollars to local and international
charities since its founding.
We have helped dozens of local charities that provide help
and hope to the homeless, to youth, to the physically and
developmentally disabled, and many more in need. Lakeland
South Rotary prides itself on helping those organizations
that lend a hand up, not just a hand out. The club believes
in personal accountability and a strong work ethic. The club
has provided scholarships for local colleges, provided
support for local schools and youth groups such as the Boy
Scouts and Police Explorers, and has raised and donated
thousands to support local firefighting efforts, to improve
and expand parks, and to improve Lakeland’s quality of life
for its residents and visitors.
Lakeland South Rotary also participates in international
charitable giving through direct support of Rotary
International beneficiaries, such as the fight against Polio
and international aid projects. Our club has taken on
specific projects such as providing computers to schools in
India, water projects in South America, and medical
treatment and supplies in Eastern European countries.
Lakeland South Rotary is also a group of people who are
great friends. We have fun together and provide many
opportunities for social interaction, business and
professional networking, and leadership development. We
pride ourselves in not only helping others, but having a
darn good time in the process!
Rotary International is the world's first service club organization, with more than 1.2 million members in 33,000 clubs worldwide. Rotary club members are volunteers who work locally, regionally, and internationally to combat hunger, improve health and sanitation, provide education and job training, promote peace, and eradicate polio under the motto Service Above Self.
· Chartered December 11, 1968
· LSR is a fifth generation club of the original Chicago Club started by Paul Harris. We were sponsored by the Lakeland Rotary Club, which had been sponsored by the Tampa Rotary Club in 1918. The Tampa Rotary Club was sponsored by the first Rotary club in Florida, the Jacksonville Rotary Club (chartered in 1912), which was sponsored directly by the Chicago Club.
· First meeting place was the Crest Restaurant (now the Peking House); later moved to the Holiday Inn South; then, in 1975 to The Lakeland Center. The club remained at The Lakeland Center until 2008 when the club moved to the First United Methodist Church. In June of 2010, the club moved to its current location at the Lakeland Yacht & Country Club at 929 Lake Hollingsworth Drive, Lakeland.
· Chartered with 33 members; three remain in the club: Ludwig Spiessl, Don Jeffares, and Lynn Campbell.
· In 1999, held the first annual Lakeland South Rotary Annual Dinner, our annual dinner and auction event. This fun event is our main fundraiser and has allowed us to funnel hundreds of thousands of dollars to local charities.
The
world's first service club, the Rotary Club of Chicago, was
formed on 23 February 1905 by Paul P. Harris, an attorney
who wished to capture in a professional club the same
friendly spirit he had felt in the small towns of his youth.
The Rotary name derived from the early practice of rotating
meetings among members' offices.
Rotary's popularity spread, and within a decade, clubs were
chartered from San Francisco to New York to Winnipeg,
Canada. By 1921, Rotary clubs had been formed on six
continents. The organization adopted the Rotary
International name a year later.
As Rotary grew, its mission expanded beyond serving club
members’ professional and social interests. Rotarians began
pooling their resources and contributing their talents to
help serve communities in need. The organization's
dedication to this ideal is best expressed in its motto:
Service Above Self.
By 1925, Rotary had grown to 200 clubs with more than 20,000
members. The organization's distinguished reputation
attracted presidents, prime ministers, and a host of other
luminaries to its ranks — among them author Thomas Mann,
diplomat Carlos P. Romulo, humanitarian Albert Schweitzer,
and composer Jean Sibelius.
In 1932, Rotarian Herbert J. Taylor created The
Four-Way Test, a code of ethics adopted by Rotary 11 years
later. The test, which has been translated into more than
100 languages, asks the following questions:
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?
During World War II, many clubs were forced to disband, while others stepped up their service efforts to provide emergency relief to victims of the war. In 1942, looking ahead to the postwar era, Rotarians called for a conference to promote international educational and cultural exchanges. This event inspired the founding of UNESCO.
In 1945, 49 Rotary club members served in 29 delegations to
the UN Charter Conference. Rotary still actively
participates in UN conferences by sending observers to major
meetings and covering the United Nations in its
publications.
"Few there are who do not recognize the good work which is
done by Rotary clubs throughout the free world," former
Prime Minister Winston Churchill of Great Britain once
declared.
As it approached the 21st century, Rotary worked to meet society’s changing needs, expanding its service efforts to address such pressing issues as environmental degradation, illiteracy, world hunger, and children at risk.
In 1989, the organization voted to admit women into clubs
worldwide and now claims more than 145,000 female members in
its ranks.
After the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the dissolution of
the Soviet Union, Rotary clubs were formed or re-established
throughout Central and Eastern Europe. The first Russian
Rotary club was chartered in 1990, and the organization
underwent a growth spurt for the next several years.
More than a century after Paul Harris and his colleagues chartered the club that eventually led to Rotary International, Rotarians continue to take pride in their history. In honor of that first club, Rotarians have preserved its original meeting place, Room 711 in Chicago’s Unity Building, by re-creating the office as it existed in 1905. For several years, the Paul Harris 711 Club maintained the room as a shrine for visiting Rotarians. In 1989, when the building was scheduled to be demolished, the club carefully dismantled the office and salvaged the interior, including doors and radiators. In 1993, the RI Board of Directors set aside a permanent home for the restored Room 711 on the 16th floor of RI World Headquarters in nearby Evanston.
Today, 1.2 million Rotarians belong to over 32,000 Rotary
clubs in more than 200 countries and geographical areas.
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