1920s Rostrum was founded by
Sidney F. Wicks. Wicks who was an author, an advertising executive for the
Manchester Guardian,
public relations practitioner Company Director and Newspaper Chief Editor. He came to believe that people needed to think through their own decision-making processes rather than just accept the promotions of the press and other interested parties. On 21 July 1923, he founded a club in
Manchester with the prime purpose to encourage men to listen to many sources before formulating their own opinions, and then to speak their minds to groups of others in a way that would encourage them to listen. The club began as an offshoot of the Manchester
YMCA Businessmen's Speaking Class. After the first meeting under a
yew tree at
Greendale Farm near Manchester, meetings for YMCA members were held on Wednesday evenings in the local YMCA building. In 1924 a young Australian Engineer training in Manchester,
Alan Crook (later MBE), joined Rostrum while studying at the
Victoria University of Manchester. The following year he returned to Australia.
1930s Crook, with the help of Robert Swainson and Stuart McPhee, formed a Rostrum Club in Sydney. Like the Manchester Club, this was a dinner club. In November 1931, "Luncheon Club No.1" was formed, Alan Crook again being the first President. This discussion lead to the first
South Australian meeting. It was held in
Adelaide on 18 February 1936 in the inner suburb of
North Terrace. In 1937, Alan Crook took a business trip to
Brisbane and during this trip, he initiated
Queensland's first club on 6 May 1937. By November that year Brisbane's second club was launched. An Australian Rostrum Council was established on 5 January 1938, bringing together the state Daises. Fred Seamons was the President for the first eight years. Alan Crook served as Secretary for 27 years until his death on 9 August 1965. By the end of the 1930s there were many Rostrum clubs throughout NSW, Victoria, SA and Queensland.
1940s Victorian Rostrum Clubs held their first conference at Healsville Golf Club in 1940 Rostrum in Australia took a while to spread further west and south, as
World War II curtailed expansion. However, there was some growth to the north, with the
AHG Rostrum Club running in the Changi POW camp from 1943 to 1944. The first club in
Tasmania started in 1947 and
Western Australia's first club was founded on 21 May 1948.
1950s The second Rostrum Club in the UK was started in 1951. By this time, there were nearly 100 Rostrum Clubs in Australia. Speaking clubs were not as popular in the UK as in Australia, the main speaking club group there at the time,
Toastmasters had only six clubs before World War II. The ACT's first club was founded on 3 March 1953. In the 1950s the
Penguin Club of Australia, which was a similar club to Rostrum but for women, continued to expand. It had groups in every state and in 1956 the Federal President,
Jean Ellis, witnessed a first branch in Canberra. Interesting, it shows that the new Penguin Club was expecting a member of Rostrum to attend their meeting to offer constructive criticism of the new members. In the same year, the Secretary of the Victorian Dias, Jo Davis, began a speaking competition for Victorian members. This competition later took his name as the "Jo Davis Cup" after his death in 1967. In the late '50s, a Dais was formed for the
ACT. This Dais went on to include clubs from nearby parts of NSW. A book titled
Rostrum in Victoria: 1934–1959 by RE Tonkin was released by the Victorian Dais around this time.
1960s The 1960s were a time of rapid growth in the organisation in the ACT and surrounds. Five new clubs became established there during this time. In 1965 Alan Crook died, shortly after receiving an
MBE for his work establishing Australian Rostrum.
Have something to say: a text book for public speakers was written in 1969 by ACT member Laurie Burgess. The competition is also known as the "National Rostrum Speaking Competition" and "Sidney Wicks Trophy". 1984 saw Victorian member David Shaw write
Towards Better Meetings. The fourth Sidney Wicks competition was held in Hobart on 7 August 1999 in conjunction with the first Rostrum National Convention. The winner was Andrew Dickson from the ACT zone.
2000s 2000 saw the release of
The torch of truth and freedom: the South Australian Rostrum history, 1936–1999 by Colin Chiverton, ==State and territory competitions==