… the Rotary Club of Bukit Mertajam and the weekly meetings were held at the Rest House, Bukit Mertajam. The territorial limit of our club extended over the whole of Province Wellesley right up to South Kedah. The charter members numbered 34 and most of them were Europeans. By the year 1966, the venue of the weekly meetings were moved to Butterworth in view of the fact that most of the members were from Butterworth.

From dinner meetings, we changed to lunch meetings at the Tin Club, Butterworth. By this time almost all the Rotarians in the club were Malaysians. In 1968, Rotary International agreed to our proposal that the club’s name be changed to Rotary Club of Butterworth and the territorial limits were limited to Province Wellesley (now known as Seberang Perai District). At around this time, we came into very lean times when our membership dropped to just six members.

The 6 remaining Rotarians were Robert David, Dr. Michael, the late Syed Hassan, the late Kurian and the late M.P. Mathew. In just a year, we brought up our membership to 18 and were rewarded the District 330 membership Development trophy in 1970. From 1970 onwards, members of the RAAF (Royal Australian Air Force) Base showed interest in Rotary and a number of them joined us. At one time, out of a membership of 25, 12 of them were from RAAF. Until their departure in the 1980’s, RAAF personnel were very much a part of our Rotary Club. From the Tin Club, RC Butterworth moved their meeting venue to the Butterworth Library at Jalan Pantai and that is where the Club donated 10,000 books to the library under the World Community Service Project. From there, we shifted to the Gala Restaurant in the old Hotel Kuala Lumpur and thereafter to the Rose Restaurant at Jin Mohd Saad, Bagan Jermal.

Special mention must be made of two outstanding honorary member from that period Air Commodre Bemie Reynolds, O.C. RAAF Base Butterworth and Dato Mohd Feisol b. Hj. Hassan, President of the Municipal Council, Seberang Perai. They rendered the club invaluable and unselfish support in all our club undertakings and their services will be always appreciated.

From 1975 onwards, the Club has been in the upward trend in all its activities. The club meetings moved to Travel Lodge, Butterworth and later on to our current venue of Safira Club, Seberang Jaya. The Club has carried out countless number of projects over the years, centered mainly on helping out the poor, the needy and the under privileged segments of the society. A few of our outstanding projects over the years deserve mention here. The club had used matching grants in the region of RM35,000 and RM40,000 respectively to put up a library in SJK(T) Ladang Prye, Prai and equip and supply SMK Convent, Bukit Mertajam with much needed furniture and equipment. We have also donated a multimedia lab to SMK St. Mark’s in 2012 consisting of 27 computers, and printers for the use of the students. We bought a Haemodialysis machine for RM45,000 installed at the Bagan Specialist Centre for the use of poor patients at a low and affordable price. We have bought vans and continuously supply firefighting equipment worth thousands of ringgit to the firefighting associations of Bagan Ajam, Raja Uda, New Chain Ferry, Permatang Pauh, Juru, Kota Permai and Sg. Puyu.

In the early years, the public library in Butterworth received thousands of books through our efforts and we were also instrumental in setting up libraries in schools in Butterworth and Tasek Gelugor through World Community Service (WCS) assistance. We have organized medical camps and eye camps almost on an annual basis at different venues in mainland Penang that has brought much needed medical attention to the poor and needy. There are many more projects to enumerate but needless to say, each and every one of them had benefited the community enormously.

At the International level, we have a sister club in Phuket, Thailand since 2002 and we have undertaken a clean water supply project for a school there as well as supplying books and providing infrastructure for another school there. In 2009, the Club celebrated its 50th Golden Jubilee anniversary under the presidency and leadership of Dr. T. Kanagesvaran at the Safira Country Club.

this article was penned in 2009 by the late ROBERT DAVID, a past President and distinguished member of the Club