'Very impactful' Cape Girardeau Rotary turns 100

In celebration of Cape Girardeau Rotary’s 100th anniversary, Rotary International president-elect Mark Daniel Maloney addressed a crowded room Friday at Isle Casino Cape Girardeau.

Upon arrival Friday, Maloney described the Cape Girardeau club as “a very impactful group” within Southeast Missouri.

“... All of the significant leaders of the community are in the club, and that gives them the ability to have a significant impact on the community, identify the needs of the community and provide the projects to help support the community,” he said.

After dinner, Duane Benton, circuit judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, introduced Illinois native Maloney as “the most prepared for [president of Rotary International] we’ve ever had.”

1919 was a transitional year for the organization, he said, “and you can see that in the history of Rotary.”

“Last year we had 95 club centennial celebrations, this year we have 93,” Maloney said. “Next year, during my year as president, we have 235 centennials to celebrate.”

He jokingly added, “I will not make them all.”

And now, 114 years later, Maloney said referencing the founding of Rotary International, “look what that little club started.”

When an anniversary in Rotary is marked, it is natural to look back at the first event or the first marker in the timeline, he said. Each year in Rotary on Feb. 23, members look back to the founding four men and “that one room in Chicago.”

But when the anniversary is celebrated, it is not focused on the four founding men, he said. Instead, “We are celebrating everything that has happened since then.”

The reason for celebrating is not the founding of the club, he said, or the “nice round number of years” that have passed since its inception.

“We are here to celebrate everything that this club has achieved since the day it began,” Maloney said, “everything that the Rotary Club of Cape Girardeau has done in the intervening 100 years to make the City of Cape Girardeau, Southeast Missouri, the United States, and the world a better place.”

A Rotary anniversary is a time to look back, according to Maloney, and to contemplate what happens over time when “enough drops of good land in the same bucket.”

Maloney said, “And I think all of us are very glad the Rotary no longer makes any distinction in its events, as being for the ladies or the gentlemen.”

Rotary is far better off now, he said, with one in every five Rotarians being a woman.

Maloney said he can “only hope” it will not take another 60 years to acquire “gender balance in our membership” represented by “not one member in five, but one member in two being female.”

“We realize over time that not only is the world better off because of Rotary, but each of us is better off, as well,” he said.

According to Rotary International’s website, Maloney is set to be declared the president-nominee Oct. 1.

Maloney has been a Rotarian since 1980, according to the website, and has served as foundation trustee and vice chairman. He also has participated in the Council on Legislation as chairman, vice chairman, parliamentarian and trainer.

The Cape Girardeau Rotary organization began Jan. 28, 1919.

jhartwig@semissourian.com

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