Harry Rogers was born on a farm near Wheatland, Missouri, U.S.A., on May 24, 1877, and educated at Weaubleau Christian College. A precocious student, he began teaching school himself at age 15 and taught until he was 25, meanwhile studying at home to earn a law degree. Upon receiving the degree, he moved to the Oklahoma Territory and, in 1903, began a practice in the small town of Wewoka.

He later moved his practice to the city of Tulsa, and became a member of the Rotary club there. He was active in civic life, serving as president of the Tulsa Chamber of Commerce, and then going on to head the State Chamber and the Oklahoma Bar Association. In 1920, he and his wife moved to San Antonio where he built the Uvalde and Northern Railway, helped to build the San Antonio Cotton Mills, retaining his membership in his law firm in Tulsa and keeping active in his oil production business there. Harry was a director of several banks in Oklahoma and Texas and served as President of the Exchange National Bank.

He was a director of several banks in Oklahoma and Texas and president of two of them. With two associates he founded the Uvalde and Northern Railway and assisted in building a cotton mill in San Antonio.

He became involved in community service activities Tulsa, and after the move, continued with community service in San Antonio. He was at various times President of the Tulsa and San Antonio Chambers of Commerce, the Oklahoma Chamber of Commerce, the Oklahoma Bar Association and the San Antonio Independent School District Board.

A member of the Christian Church, sharing his faith as Bible study leader and elder, Harry also served as president of the International Convention of the Disciples of Christ, a Protestant denomination. He headed the boards of the Mexican Christian Institute and the Community Welfare Council, and served on the boards of Phillips University in Oklahoma, the University of Oklahoma, the University of Texas, Texas Christian University, and Peabody College in Tennessee. He assisted the Osage Indians in attaining titles to land, much of it in oil-producing territory, thereby helping to make the tribe one of the wealthiest in the nation.

He was just as active as a Rotarian. As soon as he moved to San Antonio from Tulsa, in 1920, Harry joined the Downtown Rotary Club (now the Rotary Club of San Antonio). Only two years later, in 1922, he became its President. That was the year when a lot of things happened at the International Convention. RI’s Constitution and Bylaws were revised to require all clubs organized after 1922 to adopt the new Standard Club Constitution, and the name of the parent organization was changed to Rotary International. It was also a year for district reorganization, and most of Texas became District 13.

Harry Rogers became the 1924-25 Governor for the 13th District at the Toronto convention on Friday June 20, 1924. The territory consisted of nearly the entire state of Texas except for an area south of the eastern boundary of New Mexico. By June of 1924, District 13 had more than 90 Clubs. During his year as Governor, Rogers traveled more than 18,000 miles around the district.

It was just the very next year that Harry Rogers became a Director of Rotary International, the Rotary Year 1925-26. At the convention in Cleveland, Ohio, USA, from June 15-19, 1925, he was nominated for Director from the US by Paul Rieger of the Rotary Club of San Francisco, California, and the nomination was seconded by Roy Yoke of the Rotary Club of Morgantown, West Virginia on Wednesday morning June 17th, 1925. He received 1,355 votes and was declared a Director on Friday morning, June 19th, 1925.

He was elected President of RI for 1926-27 at the convention of 1926, in Denver, Colorado, USA. Nominated for President by Jack Orr, of the Rotary Club of Miami, Florida, the nomination was seconded by Fred Birks, of the Rotary Club of Sidney, Australia and George Rooke, of the Rotary Club of Regina, Canada on Wednesday morning June 16th, 1926. The other nominations that year were Arthur H. Sapp of Huntington, Indiana and Tom J. Davis of Butte, Montana. Harry Rogers received 1204 votes of 2567 cast; and after a motion made by Arthur Sapp and seconded by Tom Davis, the Secretary (Chesley Perry), pursuant to the instructions of the convention, cast a unanimous ballot of the convention for Harry H. Rogers for President of Rotary International, on Thursday morning, June 17th, 1926.

At the end of his Rotary year, during the 1927 convention in Ostend, Belgium, Harry was awarded the Order of the Cross from King Albert of Belgium. After the close of the Ostend convention, the Rogers’ were received by King George and Queen Mary at Buckingham Palace.

After his presidency, Harry remained active in his home club, on the speaking circuit of other clubs and on the International Board by accepting the first Chairmanship of the new Rotary International Foundation.

In 1947, following the death of Rotary founder Paul P. Harris, Harry Rogers was appointed the Chairman of The Rotary Foundation for his second term. Considered by many to be the greatest TRF chair since Arch Klumph, Harry spearheaded a US $2 million memorial campaign benefiting the Foundation, finally placing it on a sound footing for the first time in its existence.

Harry Rogers died on 3 December 1957.

Harry Rogers’ 1926 Christmas message is just as appropriate today as when it was written. Here is one paragraph from it: "Rotary pleads for a toleration of the peculiarities of the other fellow's was of doing things, for appreciation of those qualities of the other fellow that are fine, and for that spirit of cooperation which is a logical sequence of toleration and appreciation. These three essentials make possible a neighborly community. Expanded and developed they will make possible a peaceful world of neighborly nations. If we have 'good will toward men' of every nation, we can confidently look forward to 'Peace on Earth'."

Doug Rudman

Sources for this biography include the History of the Rotary Club of San Antonio, the History of District 5870, prepared by Kaye Boyd (Waco), District 5870 Historian; Proceedings of the Annual Rotary Convention, 1924, 1925 and 1926; Paul Harris and His Successors: Profiles in Leadership; and the Archives of Rotary International.