The Bath Rotary Club has been serving the Bath community for almost 100 years. Sponsored by the Lewiston/ Auburn Rotary Club in 1919, the Bath Rotary has done many local projects benefitting the Bath area. One longstanding program are scholarships for graduating Morse High School seniors. Two seniors receive $1000 scholarships in their first year of college. The Bath Rotary Charitable Trust also awards two $1,000 scholarships to graduating Bath Region Career and Technical Center students continuing their education.

Other projects have included the construction of the Pavilion at Waterfront Park on the Kennebec River that consists of a covered shelter over picnic tables for visitors to the park to enjoy. More recent contributions have included assisting with the purchase of batting cages for the Bath Little League, children’s books for the United Way’s Success By 6 and the children’s room at the Patten Free Library, as well as contributing to the Red Elf Project that provides gift certificates for books for elementary school children. Younger children and families have benefited from the Bath Rotary’s contribution to the United Way’s Diaper Project as well as elementary school students in Bath, West Bath and Phippsburg who are recipients of the Bath Area BackPack Program’s backpack meals and snacks. Older residents in our area have benefited from Bath Rotary’s contributions to SEARCH Greater Bath where volunteers provide companionship, telephone reassurance calls, home visits, transportation, assistance with grocery shopping, and errands to help seniors live independently in their own homes. Big Brothers/Big Sisters of Bath/Brunswick has received our community service funds as they have expanded their school-based program in Bath. Other organizations such as Oasis Free Clinics, The Chocolate Church, Bath Police Community Safety Day, Project Graduation, the Bath Elementary PTA, and Friends of Sequin Island Light Station have also been recent recipients of our funds.The Bath Rotary Club also sends at least 5 and as many as 9 “rising juniors” from Morse High School to the Rotary Youth Leadership Award (RYLA) program at Camp Hinds in Raymond where participants hone their leadership and communications skills through team-building exercises with other youths from southern Maine and New Hampshire.

Our major fundraising events include our annual golf tournament, which will be held on Saturday, June 23, 2018 at the Bath Golf Club and the 4-Way 5K walk/run and the electronic waste collection, both to be held in October. But the Bath Rotary helps other organizations directly, such as the Bath Area Food Bank. We will holding a Full-A-Bus event for the Bath Area Food Bank at Brackett’s Market on Saturday, February 3rd (just before the Super Bowl) where we will be collecting food and monetary donations. We also assisted the Salvation Army and have staffed the kettles around Bath on Saturday, December 16th. And it’s not all about raising money; for many years the Bath Rotary has been assisting the City of Bath and Main Street Bath by helping to decorate the downtown by stringing lights for the holiday season. We have gone from using poles and ladders to place strings of lights into the trees that line Front and Centre Streets to wrapping the lamp posts with LED lights. These community service projects are made possible with the collaboration of other service groups in Bath that include the Bath Sunrise Rotary Club, the Morse Interact Club and the Morse SLSC.

With our 100th year fast approaching in 2019, the Bath Rotary Club is making plans to provide a permanent public marker that Bath residents and visitors alike can enjoy at the soon to be constructed Bath River Walk linear park along the Kennebec River. Details are still being worked on by the 100th Anniversary committee and the goal is to dedicate it in March 2019, the anniversary month of the Bath Rotary Club’s charter. The Bath Rotary is not only grateful for its longevity in the Bath community through its dutiful membership, but to the sponsors and participants in our events that amplify our efforts in improving and enhancing our society.

We always warmly welcome visitors interested in knowing more about Rotary and what we do. You can join us at our weekly meetings every Tuesday noon at J. R. Maxwell’s, 122 Front Street, Bath and on the web at bathrotary.org.