Unveiling of Paul Harris Plaque at Annbank Church

Ayr Rotary Club organised the unveiling of a QR plaque at a service in Annbank Church on Sunday 26^th July to commemorate the fact that Paul Harris [the founder of Rotary International] used to stay in the Manse when his Brother in Law, John Thomson, was Minister in Annbank back in the 1920’s. He taught Paul about Robert Burn’s work and Paul talks about this being the meaning of Rotary on the video by opening the QR code on the plaque in the church grounds.

This Ayr Rotary project has come to fruition after many years of dedicated work by Ayr Rotarian John Ewing.

Paul Harris was born in 1878 in Wisconsin USA and largely raised by grandparents. He studied Law in Princeton University and after graduating, rather than start a Law Practice, which he did subsequently in Chicago, he went to sea signing up as an ordinary seaman on a ship taking cattle to Europe, in his endeavour to see the world. He experienced two trips visiting Scotland on the second. It is hard to imagine the rough seas and conditions onboard a ship in the middle of the Atlantic, especially in winter.

He later married a Scottish girl, Jean Thompson in 1910. She had emigrated to the USA to make a better life. Jean`s brother was a Church of Scotland Minister in Greenock later moving to Annbank Church, just outside Ayr.

When Paul Harris and his business friends started the Rotary Movement in Chicago, based on Fellowship and Community Service, it grew quickly and soon spread to other towns and cities and indeed other European Cities.

As husband and wife, Paul and Jean, were tasked with expanding Rotary and on a European visit, conveniently Jean’s brother was living in his large church manse outside Ayr in Annbank and based themselves there during their travels. Jean`s brother Rev. Thompson was a lover of Robert Burns Works and we believe he passed this love onto Paul Harris.

The first Rotary meeting was held in Chicago in 1905 with now over 1.5 million members world wide.

What is less known is that Abraham Lincoln carried the writings of Burns around and he and his wife Mary Todd Lincoln intended to to visit Ayrshire to visit Ayrshire and would have done this had he was not been assassinated. However, she honoured this commitment and travelled to Scotland, visiting Burns Cottage and Brig o’ Doon in Alloway spending five weeks there during 1869.

Lord Lieutenant, Iona MacDonald, Rev Mandy Ralph, John Ewing and Ayr Rotary President, Mary Helen Shakespeare, unveiled the plaque.