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We decided during the year that I was President-Elect (1999-2000) that the club needed a new fundraiser.  For  many years prior, our fundraiser had been a dinner and art auction that benefitted the Nicolaysen.  It went from raising about $35,000 per year to about $7,000 or less at the end.  We decided we needed to include the community in the fundraiser, since the Nic auction only tapped Rotarians (and you can only go back to the well so many times before everyone is tapped out).
Dick Stribling mentioned that the Estes Park Rotary Club had been doing a Duck Derby for about 10 years and had been raising about $100,000 per year.  Their event funded social service agencies, since they didn't have a United Way there.  So, in May 2000, Gene, Mike Ward and I went to Estes to watch the event.  Their race went down the little channel of the Mad River through town, but there was a lot of excitement and lots of side activities to make it a fun day.
We came back to Casper and said SURE we can do this race--but, HOLY COW the Platte was a MUCH HUGER river!  Not to be deterred, a group of us figured out how to build a boom and finish line and duck crate and scheduled our event for the weekend after Labor Day, in 2000.  We knew we needed other activities to bring people out, so we approached the Platte River Trust to see about holding the Duck Derby at the same time as the Fall Festival.  Angela thought it was a great idea to hold the two fundraisers together, and it's been that way ever since.
We raised $35,000 that first year, and decided to allow non-profit groups to apply for grants.  Our overarching funding priority was KIDS AND COMMUNITY.  We used that approach to spending our Duck Derby money for the first three years, until we decided it took too much oversight to make sure the agencies used the money properly.  Plus we thought we could make more of a splash if we spent all the money on one project that was supported by the whole club.  
It only took a few years to be raising close to $100,000 per event.  Our first club project was the Rotary Centennial Project, Crossroads Adventure Playground, starting in 2004 and for several years thereafter. We completed the playground and the picnic structures and landscaping.
After that project, we took off on Rotary Park, which brings us to the present.