Chuck Dick Writes: There's a way to summarize 75 years of La Jolla Rotary history by saying 3 things. First, the Club was established in 1947 by a stalwart Rotarian from Club 33, and within a few years, the Club had been successful recruiting new members from across the La Jolla landscape. They were people who already had played significant roles in building a community out of a small village, and within a short time, their natural impulse to serve quickly found a vehicle in Rotary’s embrace of service above self.
Second, beginning in the 1970s and continuing for the next 25 years or so, our club called upon the extraordinary generosity of its members to support an array of service work around the world. La Jolla Rotarians contributed almost 70% of the District’s’ fundraising commitment for Polio Plus, and we obtains Rotary Foundation grants to help make changes in the third world. We worked with Tijuana Rotarians to build a school in an underserved neighborhood of Tijuana, and Colonia Esperanza stands today as source of hope.
In the third 25 years of our club, we saw that service was more than writing checks. We began to use our scholarship endowment to assist college bound La Jolla students, and we committed to help Garfield High School students launch careers. We became Rotarians at work, and we used our hands to make physical changes in our community. We have breathed life into the concept of Service Above Self.