Looking around the large dining room at Cross Creek Country Club Tuesday when the Rotary Club of Mount Airy celebrated its 75th anniversary, roughly equal numbers of both sexes were present — reflecting the group’s membership breakdown.
Such a display of gender equality was not always the case with the Rotary organization, however, according to the keynote speaker for the event.
Dr. Sylvia Whitlock owns the distinction of becoming the first-ever female president of any Rotary club worldwide, doing so in the late 1980s. Over the years she has spearheaded many charitable causes to help those in need in her community and internationally.
But in remarks to about 175 people gathered for the lunchtime anniversary event, Whitlock recalled a time when females were not allowed to be Rotary members at all — much less occupy its leadership positions.
This became apparent in 1976, when Whitlock, who is now 91 and worked as an elementary school principal in the Pasadena, California, area, was invited to join the Rotary Club in her home community of Duarte, along with two other females.
“What I knew about Rotary then would fit on the head of a pin,” the speaker — who frequently mixed humor with Tuesday afternoon’s remarks — said of her perspective at the time.
When those new members’ names were sent in to a Rotary home office, only their initials were used — to conceal the fact they were women.
“That didn’t pass the Four-Way Test, did it?” Whitlock told Tuesday’s audience here, referring to a test including things people think, say or do used by Rotarians worldwide as a moral code for personal and business relationships.
The presence of the females prompted the Rotary International leadership to write the Duarte club in California formally stating its objection to women members.
The club was advised to not even use the Rotary name under those circumstances.
“We don’t have women in Rotary,” was the prevailing message, Whitlock recalled, also mentioning that her club was threatened with losing its charter.
That prompted the Duarte chapter to rename itself the X Rotary Club, a title remaining in place for 11 years.
The ongoing attempts by women to become Rotary members would wind up in court, as most such conflicts do.
Whitlock said Tuesday that one comment at the time from an attorney opposing their admission still sticks with her:
“They’re forcing us to take everyone in, like a motel,” he said.
The case ultimately reached the U.S. Supreme Court, where Justice Sandra Day O’Connor abstained from its decision in 1987 because her husband was a Rotarian.
It favored women membership, with gender discrimination a key issue along with a “public accommodation” being involved rather than a private one due to the membership dues of many male members being paid by their employers.
Whitlock did identify one benefit from the one-sided gender demographic in place around that time. When she attended a large Rotary gathering where she was the only female present, it made access to restrooms much easier, saying she whisked by men standing in line.
Whitlock’s groundbreaking exploits also had repercussions in Mount Airy, where longtime local businesswoman Teresa Lewis became the first female local Rotary Club member and later its first woman president.
Lewis remains a member of the Rotary Club of Mount Airy and was present for Tuesday’s event.
Sylvia Whitlock, meanwhile, went on to be a distinguished leader in the organization with many worthy projects under her belt.
Whitlock has been at the forefront of such activities as helping to establish an AIDS clinic in Jamaica, supporting an orphanage in Mexico, sinking wells in Nigeria and raising almost $90,000 to educate girls in India.
“We are citizens of the world,” the guest speaker explained.
Along the way, conditions gradually changed to the point that membership by both men and women became commonplace.
“Women serve alongside me in every walk of life,” Whitlock said of the reasoning involved. “Why not in Rotary?”
Officials appreciative
After Dr. Whitlock concluded her remarks Tuesday to a standing ovation, local Rotary President Melissa Hiatt thanked her for “not being afraid to stand up” to make the membership situation better for others.
Mount Airy Mayor Jon Cawley also presented Whitlock with a key to the city.
“Thank you for educating us, and entertaining us and — most importantly — inspiring us,” he told her.
Tuesday’s event additionally drew Rotary officials from other areas of North Carolina, along with state Sen. Ted Alexander, a Republican who represents District 44 (Cleveland, Gaston and Lincoln counties).
Local legacy lauded
Also Tuesday, Mayor Cawley read a city government proclamation declaring it as “Rotary Day” locally.
The proclamation mentions how 20 local business and professional leaders held an organizational meeting in the spring of 1949 to establish a unit of Rotary International in Mount Airy.
It was formed to “encourage and foster the ideal of service as a basis of worthy enterprise,” according to news reports at the time.
The proclamation read by the mayor notes how that philosophy has been maintained by present club members, who number around 80 — about half of whom are women.
Local Rotarians work to build peace and goodwill in the lives of those who need it most, the city proclamation adds.
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