Welcome to the April issue of Rotary Digital. It’s hard to believe that the clocks ​have gone forward, Spring is officially here and as I write this….it’s still raining. No ​chance of a hosepipe ban this summer then!!

After the first two issues of Rotary Digital, this April publication is a converged ​edition featuring the best of the print magazine, along with a number of ​exclusive features for digital, particularly the People of Action pages. So you’re ​getting the best of both worlds.

You will notice the attached video was shot last month while I was visiting the ​Rotary International headquarters in Evanston, Chicago, along with Rotary ​magazine editors from across the globe.

Evanston is a quiet and tidy suburb north of Chicago, with wide avenues nestling ​on the shores of Lake Michigan. Rotary International bought the building on ​Sherman Avenue from Baxter Travenol Laboratories. Known today as One Rotary ​Center, it welcomes more than 2,000 visitors a year.

While there, I visited the offices of Rotary International President, Gordon ​McInally. It has a magnificent view over Lake Michigan and towards the ​skyscrapers of Chicago.

Gordon wasn’t there, but his office was filled with plenty of mementoes of his ​Scottish ancestry, including annuals of the cartoon characters The Broons and ​Oor Wullie, a leather rugby ball, plus a model of a bagpiper.

The video is shot in Room 711 which is a replica of Paul Harris’s Chicago law ​office where the first meeting of the first Rotary club took place at the Chicago ​Unity Building on February 23, 1905, before the Unity Building was later ​demolished.

I spent a fascinating few days talking to RI staff based in Evanston, as well as ​editors from across the globe to share ideas and look at even more effective ​ways of telling Rotary’s story, both digitally and in print, as well as across a whole ​host of media.

I hope you enjoy this edition of Rotary Digital, and if you have any comments ​about any of the articles which you would like to share in the letters page, please ​email me at: editor@rotarygbi.org

Dave King,

Editor, Rotary Digital