On January 29, 1947, the London 'Times' printed an obituary
of
Paul Harris
who had died two days earlier. It read:-
"MR PAUL P. HARRIS.
The death at the age of 78 of Mr. Paul P. Harris, the founder of
Rotary, is
reported from Chicago. A solicitor by profession, he decided to
travel before setting up
in practice so that he could gain a wide experience and thus
give his
clients sound advice. In 1905 he called together three of his
friends in
different lines of business and from this meeting sprang the
idea of the
Rotary clubs. Born on April 19, 1868, at Racine, Wisconsin, he
was
educated at Vermont, Princeton, and Iowa universitiies and
graduated in law
in 1891. He was admitted in Iowa in the same year and spent the
following
five years in travel, working as a newspaper reporter. and at
such manual
tasks as cattle tending and fruit picking.
In 1896, he felt that he had sufficient experience and began to
practice
law in Chicago. After the founding of the first club in Chicago
in 1905, a
number of clubs was formed in other cities and the need for an
organisation
to bind them together, was apparent. The National Association
of Rotary
Clubs of America thus came into being in 1910. The expansion of
the
movement into Canada and Great Britain caused an expansion of
the
organisation which became, in 1912, the International
Association of Rotary
Clubs. Thereafter the movement has grown into one of the
biggest of its
kind in the world, embracing little less that 150,000 members in
44
nations."
On February 8, a notice in the 'Times' announced that:-
"A memorial service for Mr Paul P. Harris, founder of Rotary and
President
Emeritus of Rotary International, will be held in St.Paul's
Cathedral at 12
noon on Tuesday, February 11."
The Memorial Service, which was well attended, included a lesson
read by
Rtn J.H.B.Young D.S.O . M.C. President of RIBI. The text,
taken from the
Book of Revelations, began:- "And I saw a new heaven and a new
earth.........." The address was given by the Dean of St.
Paul's, the Very
Reverend W.R.Matthews.
Not many non-British citizens are accorded the honour of a
memorial service
in St.Paul's, and it is a mark of the esteem in which Paul
Harris was held,
that he received this signal honour.
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