The Rotary Balita no. 765 (February 23, 1855)

The wheel, as a device for carrying civilization's burdens, is older than history. No one knows when or where it was invented-perhaps late in prehistoric times, probably in Asia Minor or Europe. The wheel, as a device for identifying an organization with 8,400 Clubs in 89 countries, began working for Rotary on a day in the year of its birth--1905. That was the day when one Montague M. Bear, an engraver member of the first Club, brought in a drawing of a plain, honest wagon wheel and offered it as the insigne of this new group of peppy young business and professional men in Chicago. The Founder, Paul Harris, had asked Monty to try his hand at some designs, and Paul and the others liked this one. The wheel was familiar, it was basic for theirs was and is a civilization of the wheel, And a wheel rotates. In a flash of deep perception Monty Bear had hit upon the right symbol. So that was Rotary's first wheel-the progenitor, the granddaddy, of the hundreds, thousands, and millions that today adorn lapels, road signs, dinner gongs, cuff links, rings, neckties, luncheon badges, banners, wall plaques, paper weights, menus, platforms, letterheads, and books and periodicals almost without number and almost everywhere, Monty's wheel as such was, of course, short lived. Like the initial model of anything, it was open to improvement. Even though the Club had printed up enough letterheads bearing the original wheel to last five years-which they did--members began to regard their symbol as too plain, too static. Concurring, Monty Bear worked some puffy clouds into the design. To "Long Tom" Philips, lantern-slide maker, these looked like dust, and, said Tom, "not even Rotary could raise dust before and aft of a wheel." Thus, step by step, the designer heavied up the clouds, superimposed a ribbon reading "Rotary Club"--and the wheel rolled on. All this while other Clubs were forming, in San Francisco, Oakland, Seattle, and so on, and each adopted a wheel of some sort as an emblem. By 1910, 16 Clubs had sprung up--and in that year they joined in a new National Association. Busy with a thousand Constitutional concerns, the new group took no notice of insignia. However, its office adapted Chicago's and used it briefly. Just before the 1912 Convention in Duluth, the National headquarters invited all Clubs to submit designs for an emblem on which all could standardize--the wheel to be the basic element. Thus in Duluth, where Rotary became international in name as well as in fact, Rotary acquired a gear wheel in royal blue and gold as its official emblem. But even this one was to survive only eight years. Engineers complained that it was mechanically unsound, could do no work. So a two man Committee of engineers was assigned the job of designing a technically accurate working wheel--one of the men being Oscar B. Bjorge, of Duluth, and the other Charles Henry Mackintosh, of Chicago. Their design, adopted and announced in 1920, is the one you know as official today--with one exception. Messrs. Bjorge and Mackintosh had over-looked one thing--a keyway. Without it the gear was an idler incapable of transmitting power to or from a shaft. The keyway was added, and the wheel turned on--to today and Rotary's Golden Anniversary. The mechanical specifications of it are most precise and complete--and are to be found in Rotary's Manual of Procedure or to be had from the Secretary of Rotary International. Rules governing correct usages of the emblem--by members, Clubs, and manufacturers--are likewise precise and complete, and available from the same sources. Is there any symbolism in the wheel--beyond its general representation of Rotary International? There is none--officially. But thousands of Club talks have been hung on its six spokes and 24 teeth. And where is the finest single specimen of the wheel? Appropriately, over the doorway of the one piece of property all the 8,400 Clubs of Rotary own together--their new headquarters building in Evanston, Illinois, U.S.A. Cast of metals, polished to a rich luster, the 34-inch wheel seems to speak of solidity, quality--and perpetuity. -Reprinted from THE ROTARIAN