HISTORY OF CAPE GIRARDEAU ROTARY CLUB OUTLINED

Once a week for 75 years members of the Cape Girardeau Rotary Club have met for lunch.

Their luncheon gatherings serve as a springboard for ideas to make the community a better place to live.

It was 1919, when a group of Cape Girardeau businessmen decided a fairly new organization, Rotary Club, with its goals of community service, would be good for the Cape Girardeau.

On Thursday, the Cape Girardeau Rotary Club celebrated its 75th anniversary with a luncheon and dinner featuring Clifford R. Dochterman, Rotary International president for 1992-93.

Morrell C. Diebold, president of the club, said: "It's a service club. We support a lot of the different activities and organizations. Last year we were real involved in flood relief."

John Blue, the club's historian, has compiled information about the club, its presidents and accomplishments over the years.

The Cape Girardeau club was formed Feb. 6, 1919, the 448th Rotary Club of now 26,000 clubs.

The originating group included Dr. Rex Cunningham, Dr. C.B. Ruff, and Harry L. Albert. The three had attended Rotary meetings in other cities and believed the club had possibilities in Cape Girardeau. Cunningham served as the first president.

Diebold said that international aspects of the club are especially important today. "It is the most international of all the service clubs," he said.

The organization is active in group study exchange programs. People visit foreign countries as guests of the Rotary clubs in those countries. People from that country, in return, visit Cape Girardeau.

"We also have a student exchange program. We have students who study in a foreign country for a year, sponsored by a Rotary Club," Diebold said. "In turn, foreign clubs send their students to us."

The goal, Blue said, is international peace and international understanding.

The club has been active in community projects. Over the years the group was involved in development of parks, a historical maker program, the Municipal Band, and has been a longtime supporter of Boy Scouts.

They conducted war bonds drives, funded college scholarships and even mailed vegetable seeds to India.

In 1993, the club initiated Camp Enterprise, a business institute for high school students.

The Cape Girardeau Rotary Club is the largest club in the district and the oldest in this part of the state.

In addition to maintaining its own health, the Cape Girardeau Rotary Club gave birth to other Rotary clubs. In 1927 a Rotary club was started at Illmo and Fornfelt, now Scott City. But the club went defunct during the Depression. In 1927, a club started at Fredericktown, and in 1929 a club started in Jackson. In 1966, the Cape Girardeau West Rotary Club started. It in turn organized the Cape County club.

"We have several `grandchildren' clubs," Blue said.