Kiwanis Club of Gallup Centennial John Lewis Taylor

Dick Caley, Historian for the Southwest Kiwanis District presents a weaving once owned by Merle Tucker, a Gallup Kiwanian and owner of radio station KGAK to the Kiwanis Club of Gallup to mark their centennial. L to R are Martin Link, Dick Caley, and Tommy Haws.

By John Lewis Taylor

The Kiwanis movement came to Gallup in 1920, thanks to the effort of Albuquerque businessman Henry G. Coors III. Coors was a strong supporter of Kiwanis and helped to found clubs all over New Mexico. The club he established in Gallup was the second to be formed in the state. Only the original Albuquerque Down-Town Kiwanis club is

older.

The Kiwanis movement was founded in 1915, as a service organization in Detroit, Michigan. The name Kiwanis was said to come from the Ojibwe word giiwanizi which the founders translated as “We Trade”. However, the word is often translated as “I make noise”. By 1920, the club changed the meaning to become the club motto, “ We Build”. The purpose of Kiwanis was to promote business development, improve communities, build strong bonds of fellowship, and serve the poor. Industrialist Henry Ford, became an early backer of Kiwanis and required Ford Dealers to establish a Kiwanis club in their home cities. Due to the backing of Ford and others, Kiwanis clubs grew rapidly throughout the United States.

The Gallup club was formed on May 26, 1920, and held its first regular meeting on the Fourth of July of that year. Henry G. Coors III, an Albuquerque business leader and the builder of Kiwanis clubs traveled from Albuquerque to participate in the first meeting. Gallup Indian Trader, C.C. Manning was the first president; Sam Bushman, vice-president; George A. Keepers, treasurer; Charles K. Ross secretary. The total charter membership was twenty- seven local businessmen and professionals.

In October, the Santa Fe New Mexican headline noted, “Gallup Kiwanis Club Now Firmly Established”. Dr. H. M. Bowers of the national Kiwanis association and several members of the Albuquerque Kiwanis presented thecharter to the membership. Dr. M.K. Wylder of the Gallup club welcomed the visitors and accepted the charter. The New Mexican reported that the meeting was followed by a banquet and dance that lasted until the early hours of the morning.

The Gallup Kiwanis members saw as their primary task was to make Gallup and the surrounding area known throughout the United States. They were developing the Gallup brand. A brand built on the concept of bringing tourists and businesses to northwestern New Mexico.

In 1921, the Gallup club hosted the first Inter-City meeting of the Southwestern Kiwanis clubs. The member clubs were: Gallup, Albuquerque, Raton, Clovis, Roswell, El Paso, Phoenix, and Tucson. The meeting began with Navajo Scout veteran Sila`o Nez, (Tall Soldier) performing the Navajo “Scouts Song”. The event program explained that he had served during the Geronimo campaign of the 1880s and recently performed the “Scout Song” for the King and Queen of Belgium when in 1921, the royal couple visited Gallup. The program consisted of speeches by Mayor A. T. Hannett and Dr. H. M. Bowers. The speeches were followed by an automobile tour of the city and a luncheon at the City Club. During the afternoon, J. W. Chapman gave a lecture titled, “Gallup and Kiwanis.” The evening session was taken up with Inter-City club business followed by another automobile tour of the local coal mines. That night, at eight o’clock there was a banquet at the Harvey House followed by a dance at the City Club.

The Gallup club made a point of hosting regional conferences of professional organizations. In 1922, Kiwanians welcomed the New Mexico Funeral Directors and Embalmers Association. The Albuquerque Journal headline of September 15, 1922, said that “Undertakers Given Gloom Chasing Talk By Gallup Kiwanians.”

M. E. Kirk president of the Inter-Tribal Indian Ceremonial association spoke for the local club and explained to the guests the many interesting things that are proposed for the ceremonial to be held in Gallup on September 28, 29, and 30. The Gallup Kiwanis supported many projects promoting Gallup in its early years, such as the “Park to Park Highway”, but having the collective courage to endorse the Inter-Tribal Ceremonial may be its most lasting accomplishment. Gallup Kiwanians used the Kiwanis network to boost the Ceremonial throughout the Southwest. In 1923, a delegation of Kiwanians, headed by Mike Kirk visitedboth Albuquerque and El Paso to sing the praises of the second Ceremonial. Through Kiwanis newsletters and material given out at regional and national Kiwanis conventions news of the Ceremonial and other Gallup attractions was disseminated across the United States and Canada. In 1925, Mike Kirk again with a Cowboy Band and a group of Navajos, attended the International Kiwanis convention in St. Paul, Minnesota to advertise the state of New Mexico, Gallup, and the Inter-Tribal Ceremonial.

In addition to the promotion of the Gallup economy, the Kiwanis Club worked to improve the quality of life for the citizens of Gallup. In the 1920s, the club began a tree planting campaign to plant hundreds of shade trees to make the town more attractive for residents and tourists alike. During the holiday season a large Christmas tree was installed by Kiwanians near the El Navajo Hotel for the enjoyment of all.

In the 1930s, the club advocated for a city park, noting that Gallup now had enough water to support a green park. On the Fourth of July in 1939, Kiwanians motorcaded twenty miles south of Gallup to dedicate their new picnic grounds among the pines of Vanderwagen. Kiwanis Park, as it was known, provided a venue for outings for various groups for many decades.

Gallup Kiwanians worked to meet the needs of the community beyond Gallup. Heavy snows during the Winter of 1932, caused the death of many animalsin the Crownpoint Agency of the Navajo Nation. At the request of the Agency Superintendent, Samuel Franklin Stacher, the Kiwanis, Rotary, and the Ceremonial Association raised funds to buy replacement workhorses for Navajos who lost livestock due to the harsh weather.

The war years of the 1940s, slowed some of the activities of the Kiwanis Club but by 1950, the Gallup Independent stated that the Kiwanis Club was one of the largest and most active of service clubs in Gallup. “Youth” the Independent stated, “is the keystone of the local club, especially the helping of underprivileged children and service towards all youth with the objective of better citizenship.” During the 50s, the club sought to convert an old transient camp in the Cibola National Forest near the McGaffey lumber mill into a youth camp for both Boy and Girl Scouts, 4-H Club members and underprivileged children.

During the 1960s, the Kiwanis maintained their focus on service and youth.

Merle H. Tucker, owner of radio station KGAK in Gallup, became the president of Kiwanis International and traveled the world as an advocate and booster of the Kiwanis concept of service. He also put in a plug or two for Gallup.

In the 1970s, a second Kiwanis Club was chartered in Gallup, sponsored by the established club. Known as the Sunrise club it catered to educators and others who were unable, due to their work schedules, to attend the noontime meetings of the parent club. The purpose of the Sunrise group was to serve the youth of the community. The two clubs worked in harmony to fulfill their mission of community betterment and service until they agreed to merge in 2018.

In the 1980s, the Kiwanis Clubs of Gallup, with support of the Southwest District clubs, established Kamp Kiwanis, a camp for special needs children at Kiwanis Park, south of Gallup, at picnic-grounds that the club had maintained since 1939. In addition to hosting the Easter Seals campers each year the Kamp was used for regional Kiwanis meetings, Key Club activities, (Key Clubs are a youth group sponsored by Kiwanis clubs to build leadership skills in adolescents) and other community events.

During the 1990s and the first two decades of the twenty-first century, the

Kiwanis Clubs of Gallup continued to provide service to youth. The Sunrise club at the request of Kiwanian Chuck Wade and in partnership with the Dictionary Project of Charleston, South Carolina, chose 2004, to begin an on-going project to provide every third-grade student at every elementary school in McKinley county with a student dictionary. In 2005, the International Kiwanis Clubs changed their motto from “We Build” to “Serving the Children of the World.” Focusing on improving instruction the Kiwanis Club of Gallup provided grants to high school teachers to help fund innovative instruction. Both clubs sponsored Key Clubs at the town’s high schools.

The one hundred years of philanthropic projects by the Kiwanis Clubs of Gallup needed to be supported by fundraising activities. Many were innovative and involved much planning and the involvement of the community. In the 1920s, there were musical shows and ladies’ baseball games featuring Kiwanians in drag rounding the bases for charity. In the 1930s, donkey baseball and dinner dances were popular, as were raffles and drawings for prizes. In each decade the Kiwanis pancake breakfast and spaghetti supper raised money for numerous youth activities from scholarships, Fun Run T-shirts, to giving a dictionary to every third-grader in McKinley county. In more recent times, Hollywood Night, a dinner dance where guests dress as their favorite movie star and Night Golf, playing golf in the dark with lighted golf balls at Fox Run Golf Course, have supported Kiwanis initiatives. All of these events, over the many years have depended on the generosity of Gallup and McKinley county citizens and groups for their sponsorship and support.

In the century since the Santa Fe New Mexican’s headline observed that “Gallup Kiwanis Club Now Firmly Established”, New Mexico, Gallup, the United States, and Kiwanis have changed greatly, but one factor remains the same, as J.W. Chapman remarked in his 1921, lecture, “Kiwanis is here to serve.