Venice Nokomis Rotary

The Venice/Nokomis Rotary Club was born just after World War II to help bridge a gap between a military and civilian community. Venice, conceived in 1927 as a model city in the Florida boom, became a ghost town during the Depression. In 1943 an Army Air Base was built with a military population of 10,000. This bolstered the economy until the Army vacated in 1947, leaving a voting population of 142. Something was needed to replace this void and help adjust its citizens to civilian life again. At this point the Sarasota Rotary Club stepped in to organize the Venice club. The club was chartered by Rotary International on December 26, 1947, as club number 4347 in the growing worldwide organization.