History:
The Rotary Club of Oshkosh began forming in December 1916 when 12 business and professional men began meeting in the basement of the Elks Club. Charles W. Hoyt had come to Oshkosh from Galesburg, IL and told of a national service organization, Rotary, then only 11 years old ( Northwestern, June 26, 1953). On March 1, 1917, the group was chartered and Hoyt became the first president.

Early on the Oshkosh Rotary took on activities that were " out of the ordinary" and political in nature. From petitioning the bishop not to transfer a popular priest from Oshkosh (1919) to bringing in controversial speakers on prohibition (1927), world peace (1928) & (1952), and the depression (1932), the club brought in a variety of interesting speakers from outside of Oshkosh. The club frequently invited women to attend their programs.

The early Rotarians supported programs with the Oshkosh Normal School (now UW Oshkosh), the Lions Club, the Kiwanis, the Salvation Army, church Youth Programs, Boy Scouts, a dental clinic at the high school and sponsored landscaping and gardening classes. In April of 1925 the Oshkosh Rotary had the third largest attendance at the tenth district annual meeting in Madison.

According to Henry Kimberly, Jr., the club met at the Athearn Hotel in the English Room during the late 1930s and stayed there until it was torn down. The price of meals at that time was .55. When management raised the price of meals to .65, the group moved to the Raulf Hotel/Strand Theater. The Club met at the Grey Fox for a short while and then the Pioneer Resort and Marina in the late 1970s. When the Pioneer closed for renovations in 2004, the group moved to Robbins for several months and then to Fratello's.