The Rotary Club of Witney was inaugurated at a meeting and dinner in the Masonic Hall on 10 December 1954, when the 30 founder members were joined by some 50 representatives of other Rotary Clubs from a very wide area.
The first elected officers were:
President: Jim Cousins.
Vice-President: John Bull.
Hon. Secretary: George Fagen
Hon. Treasurer: Peter Russell.
Council members: Ray Cripps, Jack Gardiner, Ray Larner,
Arthur Larner, Bunny Rymills, John Welch.
The Club received its Charter in May 1955.
The Club has produced two District Governors (Len Booth and Dick Bedwin) and won a Rotary Significant Achievement Award for World Community Service for a project in 1968 where the Club filled two lorries with medical and other supplies and sent them overland to The Shining Hospital in Pokhara, Nepal. Dick Bedwin was also prominent nationally in Polio Plus, the campaign to eradicate polio worldwide.
Locally the Club was instrumental in starting the bi-annual Trade Fair, and was involved in the formation of the Witney Scout Group, the Elms Day Centre for the elderly, the Citizens Advice Bureau and the first Probus Club in Witney. The Club is also very much involved in the annual Witney Carnival.
Since its inception, the Club has sponsored and assisted in the formation of four daughter clubs:
The Rotary Club of Wantage
The Rotary Club of Faringdon
The Rotary Club of Windrush Valley.
The Rotary Club of Eynsham