As a new Rotarian, I marveled at the dedication and unselfishness of Rotarians worldwide and wondered why there were no buildings bearing the name and logo of Rotary, and no monuments to the great causes and achievements of the men who served so proudly and well. Later I also learned about the stipulations in the Rules and Guidelines of the Rotary Foundation, the funding arm of Rorary, which prohibit the use of Foundation funds for building of any new buildings, including hospitals, meeting halls, and such, and clubs and districts , for the most part followed those stipulations as well.
Every one of the 35,000 Rotary clubs around the world grapple with the dilemma of attracting and motivating their members to actively participate in service-above-self projects with little, or no acknowledgement of their work. It seemed reasonible to me that projects that involve a lot of labor and time, and involve a structure or monument should have some kind of marker to remember it by.
The quote below answered my question quite well:
“The Rotary Foundation is not to build monuments of brick and stone. If we work upon marble, it will perish; if we work on brass, time will efface it; if we rear temples they will crumble into dust; but if we work upon immortal minds, if we imbue them with the full meaning of the spirit of Rotary as expressed in our Objects and with the just fear of God and love of our fellowmen, we are engraving on those tablets something that will brighten all eternity.”
— The Rotary Foundation
from
THE ROTARIAN, April 1929
from
THE ROTARIAN, April 1929
A local example speaks to the truth of the statement. In 2005, the Rotary Club of Marshall Texas undertook a project to build a park on a vacant city-owned lot on the square in downtown Marshall. The task included the removal of unsightly debris and bushes, landscaping the whole lot, putting in underground drip-watering system, creating raised beds, and a “natural” walkway, and providing some sort of seating (metal benches with the words “Rotary”). All of this was accomplished by club members and family, assisted by some city volunteers, in 2005-2006.
When it was finished, it was beautiful, and appropriately named “Rotary Park”. Less than five years later, July 1, 2010, the city proposed to construct and pay for a “more impressive” Rotary Park, with an outdoor pavilion, at a cost of just over $250,000.
A few months later, October 15, city manager Frank Johnson announced that a group of “donors” had come forward to provide construction costs for Rotary Park, in deal where the park was “leased” to the Downtown Development Corporation. The city commissioners approved a paired motion on the design plans for the “new park”, and a name change to “Telegraph Park”.
Suddenly, all the money, man-hours, and materials that the club had put into the project were completely obliterated and no trace or marking left that Rotary Park ever existed on that lot. It only exists in the minds of the Rotarians who created it, and in the archives of "The Marshall News Messenger". All that remains of “Rotary Park” now are the Rotary Benches that were hastily salvaged by Rotarians before the lot was completely bulldozed.
We will still remember and honor their work on Rotary Park as a labor of love, that briefly brightened the lives and lightened the load for a few weary visitors who traveled our way (and possibly inspired others to do the same), but, we remember it more for the lesson that we learned in the process. That lesson is that what we build is temporal, but, “if we work upon immortal minds, if we imbue them with the full meaning of the spirit of Rotary as expressed in our Objects and with the just fear of God and love of our fellowmen, we are engraving on those tablets something that will brighten all eternity.”
Want you join us August 24, 2019, at the Marshall Convention Center, when we truly will “Celebrate a Century of Changing Lives in Marshall---And Beyond”.