JCI History

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1997 JCI WP Crispin C. Dy, Jr. (Philippines)

Wed, 27 Dec 2006 02:11:16 +0000

The death of Englands Princess Diana and Mother Teresa of Calcutta engendered a profound outpouring of emotions and sentiment from people around the globe in 1997. But there were other tragedies that caught the worlds headlines that year --- the Asian Financial Crisis that shook much of Asias so-called tiger economies triggered an avalanche of collapsing businesses, lost family fortunes and currency devaluations that affected a great number of investors and entrepreneurs. More...

1997 JCI Board Members

1976 JCI WP Feliciano Belmonte, Jr. (Philippines)

Tue, 26 Dec 2006 00:14:37 +0000

A surprising turn of events marked the 1975 JCI World Congress in Amsterdam, Netherlands, when Atty. Feliciano R. Belmonte, Jr., then the Chairman of the JCI Select Committee on Membership Growth and considered an underdog, was unexpectedly elected JCI President for 1976, easing out three frontrunners from Belgium, Japan and Puerto Rico. More...

1976 JCI Board Members

1995 JCI WP David Hide Oji (Japan)

Sun, 8 Oct 2006 02:07:29 +0000

Nineteen Ninety-Five exploded with a magnitude 6.9 earthquake that directly hit Kobe just two months after the conclusion of the 1994 JCI World Congress instantly killing more than 5,500 and injuring 26,000 making it the worst natural disaster in Japan since 1923. Current woes in Japan were exacerbated by a Sarin nerve gas attack in a Tokyo subway in March which killed eight and injured thousands; an extremist cult was later to blame for the dastardly strike. More...

1995 JCI Board Members

1996 JCI WP Thomas J. Clear, III (USA)

Mon, 17 Oct 2005 18:56:07 +0000

The year 1996 was a study of inchoate contradictions. It began with the capture of 2,000 Russians by Chechen rebels, whose government eventually signed a peace treaty with them five months later. With hopes of relative peace in that part of the USSR, France appeased world leaders by agreeing to end a nuclear test ban; while the United Nations Tribunal, determined to punish war criminals, charged serious war crimes to Bosnian Muslims and Croats during the Bosnian civil war. Several nations pledged at total of US$ 1.23 billion in aid to rebuild war-torn Bosnia. Later in the year, national elections were held in Bosnia that selected a Muslim to head a three-person presidency. More...

1996 JCI Board Members

1984 JCI WP Joe Murphy (Ireland)

Fri, 14 Oct 2005 02:47:03 +0000

As the world shuddered from the worlds worst industrial disaster in history with a deadly gas leak in Bhopal, India which killed 4,000 people and injuring 200,000 others; it also rejoiced at the global relief efforts by renowned celebrities towards stemming the famine plaguing 300,000 Ethiopians. The assassination of Indias Indira Gandhi shocked an entire nation. More...

1984 JCI Board Members

1981 JCI WP Genichi Gary Nagao (Japan)

Fri, 14 Oct 2005 02:38:49 +0000

1981 was remembered for its global turbulence and political assassinations, both thwarted and successful. Only a few weeks after the JCI President met United States President Ronald W. Reagan at a Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D. C., an attempt was made on Reagans life. In May, Pope John Paul II survived a shooting incident. Later in the year, Egypts President Anwar Sadat was slain just as the Mid-East peace process seemed to be making progress. The world was left shaking its head and asking Why? More...

1981 JCI Board Members

1980 JCI WP Patricio Izurieta (Ecuador)

Fri, 14 Oct 2005 02:32:14 +0000

In 1980, the passion for cash knew no borders in a decade when a movie heros dictum, Greed is good, became a worldwide credo. However, the year saw an unprecedented global inflation rate that owed much of its cause to the stark increase in gasoline prices at an all time high.

This was the tense atmosphere that JCI was facing at the beginning of the new decade. Worldwide inflation hindered much of its growth and outreach that was once a positive hallmark in the seventies. Enter Patricio Izurieta. After a mercurial rise through the organizations ranks in only seven years, the successful entrepreneur from Quito, Ecuador, was elected president at the 1979 Gothenburg World Congress. More...

1980 JCI Board Members

Overview of JCIs Early Years

Tue, 23 Aug 2005 02:07:14 +0000

The First JCI Local Organization

The origin of JCI (Junior Chamber International, Inc.) can be traced as far back as 1910 to the city of St. Louis, Missouri, USA, where a young man named Henry "Hy" Giessenbier dared to dream "impossible dreams." Giessenbier was born June 26, 1892, and was raised in St. Louis, Missouri. He was one of six children in the Giessenbier family. More...
-- The 1910s
-- The 1920s
-- The 1930s
-- The 1940s

1992 JCI WP Albert Hiribarrondo (France)

Mon, 11 Jul 2005 17:18:55 +0000

Immediately after the hugely-successful Operation Desert Storm, United States President George Bush seemed nearly invincible, both at home and abroad. His political stock increased notches higher when he and newly-elected Russian President Boris Yeltsin proclaimed a formal end to the three-decade-old Cold War and eased relations with Communist China by lifting trade sanctions against them. More...

1992 JCI Board Members

1990 JCI WP Jorge Suncar Morales (Republica Dominicana)

Mon, 27 Jun 2005 18:30:55 +0000

As 1990 dawned, the Iron Curtain had collapsed, but the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, under the leadership of Mikhail Gorbachev, was itself still intact. Yet by December 31 of the following year, Gorbachev and the Communist Party were both gone, and Lenins invincible republic was defunct after 69 years of Communist rule. More...

1990 JCI Board Members

2003 JCI WP Bruce A. Rector (USA)

Wed, 15 Jun 2005 21:00:34 +0000

The Year 2003 began with all eyes on Iraq as United States and coalition forces prepared for war and ended with the capture of Saddam Hussein. In between, public interest widened from troop movement to other high profile stories that spotlighted social issues like child abduction, legal action surrounding sex charges, civil rights for gays, safety in space exploration, the spread of global diseases and the upcoming 2004 U.S. presidential election.More...

2003 JCI Board Members

From 1944 through 1975

Wed, 15 Jun 2005 20:23:11 +0000

The information for the years 1944-1975 has been taken from Men of Vision.

JCI (Junior Chamber Internacional) was officially founded as an internacional organization in December of 1944, on the premise that young people working for mutual understanding, could prevent another holocaust from developing in the future. JCI is unique for several reasons. One is the age limit of 18 to 40 for its members. The second is its concept that no officer should serve more than one year and the third is the similarity in its structure to that of the United Nations Assembly. More...

2002 JCI WP Salvi Batlle(Catalonia)

Wed, 15 Jun 2005 02:26:34 +0000

In the year following the September 11 attacks, the world still could not escape the terror. The year 2002 featured a host of new and old conflicts, controversies and characters. Yet many of the headlines from homeland security to the showdown in Iraq could be traced to the previous years top newsmaker: the horrific attacks on New York and Washington, D.C. More...

2002 JCI Board Members

2004 JCI WP Fernando Sanchez Arias (Venezuela)

Wed, 15 Jun 2005 02:17:59 +0000

The winds blew unrelentingly through 2004, and not just the tempests that smashed the Atlantic and Gulf coasts again and again.

Gales of war and suffering battered Iraq and the Sudan; political gusts roiled America and Ukraine. And countless squalls baseball steroid scandals, flu vaccine gone AWOL, and controversies among many celebrities left many disoriented and disgruntled. More...

2004 JCI Board Members

2001 JCI WP Georges A. Bouverat (Switzerland)

Mon, 23 May 2005 18:06:06 +0000

The world entered 2001 cautiously, still wrapped in the fog of a muddled presidential election as rumors of impending layoffs began to swirl. The global economy was everyones main concern. The fate of world seemed tied to the NASDAQ and the New York Stock Exchange in the "new economic order" wrought by globalization. More...

2001 JCI Board Members

2000 JCI WP Karyn Bisdee (New Zealand)

Thu, 19 May 2005 16:45:49 +0000

It was a millennium that started with a whimper. When the clock struck midnight on January 1, the whole world seemed to hold its breath, waiting for the dreaded Y2K bug to wreak havoc on the planet. More...

2000 JCI Board Members

1999 JCI WP Yong Suk Choi (Korea)

Fri, 13 May 2005 23:38:12 +0000

As the world awaits the consequences of the Y2K bug, with more drastic millennial theorists warning of Armageddon, a number of global events have shaken the Year 1999. In Russias fragile democracy, President Boris Yeltsin survived impeachment hearings, reshuffled his cabinet twice and took military action against Islamic separatists in Dagestan and Chechnya. Worse events transpired in Yugoslavia as war erupted in Kosovo after its President Slobodan Milosevic clamped down on the province, massacring and deporting ethnic Albanians. More...

1999 JCI Board Members

1998 JCI WP Petri Niskanen (Finland)

Wed, 11 May 2005 18:58:47 +0000

Nineteen ninety-eight was a paradox of plummeting economies and promises of peace; it was also a cauldron of controversy and conspiracy. This year, the Asian economic crisis multiplied, spreading into Russia. India and Pakistan engaged in nuclear brinkmanship, and Indonesias Suharto toppled. Although Middle East negotiations inched forward then faltered, in Northern Ireland peace became tangible after decades of violence. More...

1998 JCI Board Members

1994 JCI WP Arnaud Godere (Maurice)

Thu, 28 Apr 2005 16:00:37 +0000

The Year 1994 painted a colorful canvass of world events, from the bright hues of hope in South Africas first interracial national election that installed Nelson Mandela as President, to the brilliant tints of peace between long-time adversaries Israel and Palestines first-ever accord. Elsewhere, bright strokes in Northern Ireland bring temporary peace with a ceasefire declaration by the Irish Republican Army, while Haitis government returns to normalcy with the installation of a prime minister and a full cabinet. More...

1994 JCI Board Members

1988 JCI WP Jennifer Yu (Hong Kong)

Mon, 18 Apr 2005 18:28:27 +0000

As the first signs of 1988 dawned on a tired world, peace initiatives from warring factions shed glimmers of hope for a lasting peace to millions living in war-ravaged lands. Indeed, these initiatives provided such a landscape for palpable solutions to peace for a number of nations. For one, the treaty between Angola and Cuba on one side, and South Africa on the other foreshadowed prospects of a peaceful coexistence; while the conclusion of the Iran-Iraq War, albeit bloody, saw the irrefutable end of an eight-year conflict and at least a million deaths from both camps. A wave of optimism spread in many parts of the globe and the Bobby McFerrin-inspired ditty Dont Worry, Be Happy became the unofficial theme song for countless feel good denizens.More...

1988 JCI Board Members

1989 JCI WP Isfahani Sameen (Sri Lanka)

Tue, 12 Apr 2005 22:16:30 +0000

Nineteen Eighty-Nine was the year when the world took heed of democracy much of which took root in surprising places. Buoyed by Mikhail Gorbachevs reforms and his renunciation of Moscows imperial power, movements for market-based economics and pluralist democracy toppled creaky Communist dictatorships throughout Eastern and Central Europe in 1989. More...

1989 JCI Board Members

1987 JCI WP Phillip R. Berry (USA)

Sun, 3 Apr 2005 19:53:14 +0000

The year 1987 marked a downturn in the world wide economy. The biggest newsmaker of the year was the Brazilian governments refusal to honor debt payments to foreign creditors on its US$108 billion debt. On October 19, 1987, Black Monday, coined in reference to the damaging stock market debacle which doubled the drop of the notorious 1929 crash sent Dow Jones stock prices plummeting 22 percent and wiping out most investor assets.More...

1987 JCI Board Members

1986 JCI WP Moncef Barouni (Tunisia)

Thu, 31 Mar 2005 15:06:44 +0000

The world opened in 1986 with the horrific Challenger disaster in January 28 and topped it with the worst nuclear disaster in history as the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine spewed 100 million cubic meters of radioactive particles into the air, instantly killing thirty-one and indirectly affecting 135,000 more. People Power revolutions marked the end of Ferdinand Marcos 20-year dictatorship in the Philippines and forced Haitian President Baby Doc Duvalier out of office ending years of mismanagement and corruption. More...

1986 JCI Board Members

1985 JCI WP Victor J. Chichos Luciano (Philippines)

Tue, 29 Mar 2005 21:49:54 +0000

The rise of Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev to the world stage, the stunning confirmation by British scientists on the depletion of the Ozone layer, the two massive earthquakes in Mexico City which killed 7,000 people and the sudden eruption of the dormant Nevada del Ruiz volcano in Colombia that decimated 22,000 lives, the declaration of Martial Law by the South African government following unrest in 36 states against Apartheid, and the hijacking of TWA flight 847 bound to Rome by pro-Iranian militant Shiite Muslims all dominated the headlines in 1985. More...

1985 JCI Board Members