THE ZONTA CLUB.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3381, 4 July 1927, Page 7

THE ZONTA CLUB.

(By Lady Adams )

A group of business and professional women has just met at lunch in Boston’s newest 'hotel to organise a branch of the Zonta Cluj), and to affiliate themselves with the Confederation of Zonta Clubs of America. This club began in Buffalo in 1919, and now has clubs from one,coast of America to the other, with a sturdy membership in Honolulu. Zonta is an Indian word, and means “Trustworthy,” and, so far as 1 can gather, the club is run on the hues of the Soroptimist Club—Soroptimist means Sister Optimist. The Zonta Club is a feminine Rotary Club; that is to say, only one woman from each classified business or professional occupation in each town may join. At Boston 33 women were pre- . -out, the assistant- attorney-general be(yiig elected temporary president. Also present were, the employment supervisor of the Western Union, a director of store training, an otolaryngologist, ne director of Junior Service, American Red Cross, the manager of the women’s department of an insurance company, the chairman of the board of trustees of the Repertory Theatre, the chief dietetician of a hospital, the prin--.pal of a school of cookery, a landscape architect, the head of the statistical department of a financial weekly, a composer, the superintendent of a dispensary, and an attorney. A fundamental rule of the club is that each member is called by her first name by everybody, a rule that prevails in rotary circles; I do not think it would add to the popularity ot a zonta Club in England. f Article Six runs; “To be convinced that unscrupulous means of gaining material advantage can bring nothing but failure to me and harm to others.” Another article runs: ‘ ‘To keep before me the best of all creeds: “Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them.’ ” If the Zonta Club is run with the idea of service in the minds of the members all the time —as is the case in the Soroptimist Club, the affiliation will do great good. The members of these clubs help not only each other, but specially investigated cases, and they help, swiftly, silently, and wisely. Friendship to each other first, and then to the rest of the world, is their unofficial motto, and tney might put on their official notepaper the words: “Aim: To give heart to a young person tor, an uphill charge," for that is what these kind and sympathising women are doing all the time.

It is a great honor to be a member of a club like the Zonta, to be the one selected member of one’s profe-ssion in one’s own town, and the members are justly proud of their election, in which a big house and a bigger bank account play no part. A personnel manager of a company that employs 2000 girls spoke yesterday at 'the luncheon—a Jive wire; there are, of course, to be weekly luncheons; what club in America could exist without “get-together meals?” These women will talk of their work, of their problems, of their solutions, and their speeches will bo worth listening to.