Rotary Club of London Bridge-Lake Havasu City
On December 10, 1969, the Rotary Club of Needles, California sponsored our London Bridge Club. Members of the Needles Club met with 3 Rotary District Officers, and all new prospective members at the Valley National Bank to finalize arrangements for the charter.
February 7, 1970 was the charter night. Douglas H Driggs, District Governor of District 549 presented the charter. Duke Doering was the charter President, and continued through the 1970-71 Rotary Year. The club meetings were held in the Flying Carpet Banquet room located on the second floor of the Best Western's Lake Place Inn (formerly Wonella's Restaurant)
February 7, 1970 was the charter night. Douglas H Driggs, District Governor of District 549 presented the charter. Duke Doering was the charter President, and continued through the 1970-71 Rotary Year. The club meetings were held in the Flying Carpet Banquet room located on the second floor of the Best Western's Lake Place Inn (formerly Wonella's Restaurant)
In 1985, we sponsored the second Rotary Club in Lake Havasu, called the Lake Havasu Rotary Club. They are also a lunch club that meets on Monday. A few of our members transferred to this new club.
In 1987, Rotary International allowed the admission of women into Rotary. Our first female Rotarian was Suzanne Ballard, who later became our 27th president (1996-97). Jeanie Morgan served as our 30th president (1999-2000). Lisa Fuhrman served as our 41st president (2010-2011).
In 1988, when the Mudshark Beach area was being developed into a city park, members Rick Stephens and John Hayes approached the city with our idea of donating $100,000 to the new park.
We stipulated that the monies needed to be used within the park and our donation would be in increments of $10,000 a year for 10 years. For this generous donation, the completed City park was officially named “Rotary Community Park.” Thanks to the hard work of our members selling our commemorative coins, we were able to make the 10th and final payment in 1999.
In 1990, we sponsored the third Rotary club in Lake Havasu, called the Sunrise Rotary Club. They are a breakfast club that meets on Thursday mornings. This club continues to be the smallest of the three clubs in town.
With the addition of this third club, local as well as visiting Rotarians have ample opportunities to keep From the very inception, our coin program was a success which allowed us to donate to many local organizations. Nevertheless, we continued to accumulate excess profits, and we searched for several years for a major Rotary project in Lake Havasu.
In Rotary Year 1999-2000, our own Bill Snedecor (our 24th President) served as the first District 5490 Governor from Lake Havasu City. Currently, David Simmer for Rotary Club of Sedona serves in that position.
Since 2000, we have been proud to use some of our coin profits to sponsor the “Kinderswim” program, which provides two weeks of supervised swimming lessons for kindergartners as part of their school curriculum. It is our goal that every child will learn how to survive around water. Our contribution to this program has been $7,500 each year.
We can be proud of the founding members, and those that came after them, and give them the recognition they deserve for creating and shaping a super “fun club” that strives to further serve our community.