Rotary Australia: 100 Years

Overview

This stamp issue commemorates the centenary of Rotary in Australia. The first Rotary Club in this country met in Melbourne on 21 April 1921, with Sir John Monash a founding member. Today there are more 26,000 active members in more than 1,000 Clubs.

Rotary in Australia is part of the broader Rotary International, founded in the USA in 1905 by Paul Harris, a Chicago lawyer. It is now a service-based worldwide movement devoted to community and humanitarian service, with more than 1.2 million members and 36,000 clubs. The motto of Rotary International, "service above self", reflects the organisation's humanitarian principles. Since its foundation, Rotary International has performed an essential role in international understanding and peace-building. The Rotary Foundation, established in 1928, is one of the world's largest charitable humanitarian foundations and has contributed to a 99.9 per cent reduction in polio cases globally.

To celebrate 100 years of Rotary in Australia, Rotary is celebrating the past, but more importantly looking into the future, with many new projects that deliver real, long-term solutions to the world's most persistent issues, including disease control and prevention, sustainability, drought and bushfire relief, and recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic.

Technical specifications