About Our Club
 
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All are welcome to attend our meetings! We hope you will want to become a member of our Rotary family.

The meeting time and place is 12:00 noon every Wednesday on the 2nd floor of the Saulsbury Campus Center at Odessa College. We are a nonpartisan organization that welcomes people regardless of gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, or age. Our club is a member of Rotary International and of Rotary District 5730 which includes the entire Texas panhandle and reaches down to Monahans.
 
Each year we send our President Elect and one guest to the Rotary International Convention. This unique event has been held in incredible locations such as Brazil and Portugal. The upcoming International Convention will be held in Toronto.

The Odessa Rotary Club is an organization of business and professional persons, united world wide, who provide humanitarian service and encourage high ethical standards in all vocations and build goodwill and peace in the world.
 
We actively support our local community by assisting youth groups and non-profit organizations, and providing scholarships to students at Odessa College and the University of Texas of the Permian Basin. 
 
Current programs and project examples include:
 
  • Celebrity Roast
  • Josh the Otter
  • Homework Heroes
  • First Tee DRIVE
  • Pedal to Success
  • American flag project
  • City of Odessa Employee of the Year Luncheon
  • Weekly card drawing
  • Fantasy football fundraiser
  • Thanksgiving baskets for first responders
  • Supporting local non-profits

History of the Odessa Rotary Club
The Odessa Rotary Club was organized on March 03, 1938 and admitted to Rotary International on March 09, 1938. There were twenty charter members with Joe W. Pryon being elected President, Thomas D. Murphy, Vice President, and Morris Bendix, club Secretary-Treasurer. The formation of the Odessa Club was sponsored by the Big Spring Rotary Club, and in the beginning, the regular luncheon meetings of the club were held on Friday of each week in the Elliott Hotel. In later years, the meeting date was changed to Wednesdays, with the weekly luncheons being held in the Inn of the Golden West. Several years ago, the club moved its meetings to Odessa College.

When the club received its charter from Rotary International, J. Ed McLaughlin, District Governor and later President of Rotary International, was present. Elmo Wasson, later President, was instrumental in the organization of the club. The meeting was held in the Odessa High School auditorium.
 
Today our club's membership consists of about 70 men and women who are community-minded and strive to make a difference locally and in the world. We always welcome new members to share in the joy that our projects bring to others and to ourselves.