Our Club has given leadership in many activities, large and small.

The Rotary Boys' Club dates back to our early records. In April 1918, Mr. Justice B. Russell addressed the Club on "A Boy's Ideal". For several years members of our Club gave leadership to the boys in such matters as courses in woodwork in the basement of the Boy Scout Building. New life was given to the Boys' Club in 1944 with financial aid and securing college boys as leaders, two of whom were Gordon Coles and Don MacMahon. The Club continued its work until the early 60’s when the Police Boys’ Club became active in work with boys.

Boy Scouts have received much assistance from our Club. One of the first was the donation of Scout equipment to the Troop at the School for the Blind in 1919. Halifax Rotarians have served on District and Provincial Councils of the Boy Scouts since 1920. In that year, Rotary gave $4,500 for Boy Scout work, and in 1921 an additional $2,700, with some assistance from the Progressive and Commercial Clubs. Rotarian Cliff Nickerson was the President of the Provincial Council for 18 years after serving three years as Vice-President. The island at Miller's Lake was purchased by him and given to the Boy Scout Association. Rotarian Will Tibbs served as Commissioner from the early 20s to 1947. Bill Speed, renowned also as our stunt song leader, was its able Director for many years, and following his retirement in 1962, Rotarian Donald Duncan became Executive Director. The connection with the Scout movement has continued through to the present time. After Rotarian Phil Newsome moved to Ottawa to head up the Scouting movement for the whole of Canada in 1999, Rotarian Jerry Walsh took over as Executive Director.

Adventures in Citizenship was a program that was supported by Rotary in Canada and entailed the sending of high-school students from across the country to Ottawa every spring for a short visit. Our Club committed to this program nearly every year from 1951 until the early 1980’s.

United Nations School. Our Club also sponsored students to this annual seminar at Mount Allison University, Sackville, New Brunswick.

Children of the Thirties. During the 30s, children in some city schools required more food than was available at home, and to supply the needed food, breakfast centres were set up by charitable groups. Our Club supplied $2,200 for this work. William McT. Orr was one of the leaders in this project. He was an understanding man with a wide and effective outreach and gave his energies to many worthy causes, including a campaign to raise funds for the Canadian Institute for the Blind.

Children with Eye Defects. In 1928-29 this Club backed the campaign to raise an endowment fund for the Maritime Division of the Canadian Institute for the Blind. This resulted in $200,000 being raised to which our Club also contributed $1,000.

Crippled Children. This has been one of the main fields of service in which Rotary is interested, worldwide. Prior to 1952 when our Club reconstituted the old Nova Scotia Society for the Care of Crippled Children and sponsored the first Easter Seal Campaign in the Province, substantial sums were donated by our Club to this section of the handicapped.

Rotarian Dr. Tom Acker was in the advance guard of those working with crippled children in this region. He joined our Club in 1924. During that time he established clinics for crippled children throughout Nova Scotia, P.E.I., and Newfoundland. In 1932 he was given an Honourary Membership in the Canadian Red Cross Society; in 1935 presented with a King George Jubilee Medal, and in 1962 he received an Honorary D.C.L. from Acadia University.

Camp Tidnish. For a number of years our Club has sent and supported crippled and retarded children from Halifax to the summer camp at Tidnish, near Amherst. In 1936 the Rotary Club of Amherst began a camp for about 15 under-priviledged children. Camp facilities were enlarged in 1963 to accommodate handicapped children and in 1972 our Club made a substantial contribution towards construction of a heated swimming pool. A further substantial contribution was made several years later to pay for a new kitchen. This brought the total amount paid over the years to this camp to an amount in excess of $20,000. At the present time, our Club continues to pay the annual maintenance costs on the pool.

Rotary Day Camp for crippled children was commenced in 1959, when the use of Flynn Park was given over to our Club by the City for this purpose. The Club installed a building and recreational equipment which included a wading pool and the camp was staffed by college students. The camp continued to operate each summer until 1967 when responsibility for the camp was taken over by the City of Halifax.

The Centennial School was another ambitious project undertaken by our Club. It was so named as the project was conceived in 1967, Canada’s Centennial year. In that year our Club decided that a worthwhile service could be rendered in the Mulgrave Park area by establishing a pre-school unit. The Halifax Housing Authority provided an apartment suitable as a school room for twenty children of the age of four years. Clary Beckett was in close contact with the school from the time it was set up, and was awarded a Paul Harris Fellowship in 1977. In 1982, fifteen years after its founding, the project including the Rotary equipment and information was carried on in the same location at Mulgrave Park by the Veith House School.

North End Rink. This was a community project and our Club agreed to undertake the cost of the ice making plant which amounted to $25,000.

Children's Hospital. Over the years, we have assisted the Children's Hospital in many ways such as supplying a refrigerator for storing blood, an inhalator for Cystic Fibrosis patients, and aid for the Speech Therapy Clinic. The Remedial Seating Project is described in detail in another section of this history. Rotarians Manuel Zive and Pat Wyman each gave outstanding service whilst Chairmen of the Board.

International Youth Service. We entertained many foreign students attending universities here at our luncheons, met new arrivals at the airport, and assisted in various ways.

International Service has for many years been a major project of our Club. In 1972, inspired by Capt. Davidson of the Canadian Armed Forces, we supplied the seed money which, with backing from another source, resulted in a successful Water Project making pure fresh water available not only for a school, but a whole district of Ghana. Later we gave support to building an Old Peoples Home in Ghana.

Since 1980 our Club has provided Travelling Fellowships for senior medical specialists, who returned to their countries not only as practicing physicians and surgeons, but as teachers. One of these came from Bangladesh, two from the Dominican Republic, two from China, and one from Morocco. These men visited and studied in major teaching centres, mainly in Canada.

We have also sent a 40-foot container of medical equipment and supplies to the Mona Rehabilitation Centre in Kingston, Jamaica. We also sent medical equipment to the hospital in Port Antonio, Jamaica and a front-end loader for a self-help project in Jamaica.

We also supported a fact-finding trip by a Canadian Professor to Malawi, where they have 30,000 cripples, with no orthopedic surgeons. Rotary International is helping to provide surgical volunteers for this area of work.
Our Dr. Alvin Buhr received a Rotary Medal of Merit for his leadership in these projects.

Other projects included a donation to complete the Wading Pool on the Commons, a Boys and Girls Hobby Show at the Y.M.C.A., a donation of $2,000 for workers to deal with Juvenile Deliquency, an essay contest for local High School students, setting up a classroom for crippled children at the Sir Charles Tupper School, assisting the Cerebral Palsy Association, organizing a John Howard Society, and supporting a housing project for young drug users.

During these 90 years, this Club has had within its ranks over 1,200 business and professional people of the City. These Rotarians have been active not only in our Club but have also carried the principles of Rotary into their own businesses and professions and into very many community activities. It would be hard to estimate the influence of Halifax Rotary in this City and beyond as each member demonstrated the importance of Service above Self.