One of Rotary’s earliest service projects helped to bring public toilets to Chicago, the quickly growing industrial city in the Midwest of the United States where Rotary began in 1905. Club members didn’t construct the restrooms themselves, as they sometimes do today. But just as they do today, they worked with other local groups to raise awareness of the need for sanitation in this urban area and advocated to get the project funded.

These public toilets, then known as “comfort stations,” were typically underground structures at busy sites such as parks and public squares. Civic leaders and reformers in several American cities were noting a need for them, and Rotary members in Chicago were part of the movement.

At right -  Entrances to public toilets at LaSalle and Washington Streets in Chicago, Illinois, USA. Before February 1955. These entrances no longer exist.