THIS year the Bolton Lions charity will celebrate the organisation’s centenary.

Bolton Lions Club is part of Lions International, a world wide voluntary organisation with more than 45,000 clubs in more than 200 countries and more than 1.3 million members.

It is the largest organisation of its kind in the world.

Lions are ordinary people volunteering in their local community raising money for good causes.

Their mission statement is “to create and foster a spirit of understanding among all people for humanitarian needs by providing voluntary services through community involvement and international co-operation”.

In this, their 100th year, the Lions are hoping to help even more good causes and gain even more members to help the organisation go forward into the next centenary.

The Bolton Lions have many fund raising events throughout the year and help many local good causes.

This year they are planning even more to celebrate the organisation’s special anniversary.

But how many people really know what these volunteers do in the community?

We thought the centenary of The Lions Club would be a great opportunity to explain more about how hard the volunteers work and what it means to be a Bolton Lion.

Bolton Lions is a charitable organisation run entirely by volunteers.

This year the Lions charity celebrates its centenary and events are planned all over the country and internationally.

It was started in 1917 by Melvin Jones, a 38-year-old Chicago business leader who told members of his local business club they should reach beyond business issues and start to help their communities.

After contacting similar groups around the United States, an organisational meeting was held on June 7, 1917, in Chicago, Illinois, USA.

The new group took the name of one of the invited groups, the “Association of Lions Clubs,” and a national convention was held in Dallas, Texas, USA in October of that year. A constitution, by-laws, objectives and a code of ethics were approved.

There are 1.35 million men and women today who are members of the world’s largest service club association — 17,000 of them based in 900 Lions Clubs in the British Isles and Ireland.

It was thanks to the support of Canadian Lions — and the intervention of Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother — that the first Lions club in London was founded in 1950.

Canadian Lions had provided invaluable support for children orphaned in the Second World War. To thank them the, then, Queen sent her equerry Colonel Edward Wyndham (later Lord Leconfield) to Canada.

He was so impressed that Windsor (Ontario) Lions Club agreed to sponsor the first London club, with Lord Leconfield as its founding Charter President.

Bolton Lions club was established in 1969.

The club is active in helping various local causes.

It is probably best known for its Caring Christmas Campaign, run for more than 30 years in conjunction with the Bolton News helping thousands of needy children in the area.

It is a massive undertaking but one the members — many of whom are of retirement age — approach with enthusiasm and gusto.

Christmas 2016 saw Bolton Lions help 1299 children by providing 7,500 gifts.

They also run the hospital radio and the message in a bottle scheme providing bottles which help the emergency services when attending, particularly, the homes of elderly people.

The bottles contain emergency information such as a list of medications.