Key
Club was started in May 1925 in Sacramento, California,
by the local Kiwanis club. The original purpose of Key
Club was to provide an active, vocational guidance
program for the student body. Later, in response to many
other opportunities for service in the school, Key Club
began to expand. Today Key Club is the largest high
school service organization in the world. It has become
the high school service club.
At
the outset, Key Club grew with the help of Kiwanians who
visited the Sacramento club and came away with the idea
of introducing the high school service club to their own
communities. This idea spread quickly, and soon Key
Clubs began to form across the United States.
By
1939, Florida had enough clubs to hold a state
convention and form an association of Key Clubs, thus
starting the first districts. Members then traveled to
Florida for the first International Convention. There,
Malcom Lewis, from West Palm Beach, Florida, was elected
the first International President.
Key
Club experienced a banner year in 1946, during which the
first Canadian club was established, and the official
publication of Key Club International, KEYNOTES, was
first published. Also in that year, at the convention in
New Orleans, the Key Club International Constitution and
Bylaws were adopted.
With
the Constitution and Bylaws as a guide, Key Club
International has since spread across North America and
to seventeen countries, which have now been divided into
31 districts. |
