Loyal Order of Moose

History

The Loyal Order of Moose was founded in Louisville, Kentucky, in the spring of 1888 by Dr. John Henry Wilson. Originally intended purely as a men's social club, lodges were soon founded in Cincinnati, Ohio, St. Louis, Missouri and Crawfordsville and Frankfort, Indiana. The early order was not prosperous. Dr. Wilson himself was dissatisfied and left the order of the Moose before the turn of the century. When Albert C. Stevens was compiling his Cyclopedia of Fraternities in the late 1890s, he was unable to ascertain whether it was still in existence.

In the fall of 1906 the Order had only the two Indiana lodges remaining. On October 27 of that year James J. Davis became the 247th member of the Order. Davis was a Welsh immigrant who had come to the US as a youth and worked as an iron puddler in the steel mills of Pennsylvania, and an active labor organizer (he later became Secretary of Labor in the Harding administration). He saw the Order as a way to provide a social safety net for a working class membership, using a low annual membership fee of $10–$15. After giving a rousing address to the seven delegates of the 1906 Moose national convention, he was appointed "Supreme Organizer" of the Order. Davis and a group of organizers set out to recruit members and establish lodges throughout the US and Canada. He was quite successful and the Order grew to nearly half a million members in 1,000 lodges by 1912.

Mooseheart & Moosehaven

At the 1911 convention in Detroit, Davis, who now “Director General” of the Order, recommended that the LOOM acquire property for an "Institute", "School" or "College" that would be a home, schooling, and vocational training for the orphans of LOOM members. For months offers came in and a number of meetings were held regarding the project. It was eventually agreed that the center should be located somewhere near the center of population, adjacent to both rail and river transportation and within a day's travel to a major city. On December 14, 1912 the leaders of the organization decided to purchase the 750-acre Brookline Farm. Brookline was a dairy farm near Batavia, Illinois. It was close to the Fox River, two railway lines and the (then dirt) Lincoln Highway. The leadership also wished to buy additional real estate to the west and north owned by two other families, for a total of 1,023 acres. Negotiations for the purchases were held in January and February 1913, and legal possession of the property was taken on March 1. The name "Mooseheart" had been adopted for the school at the suggestion of Ohio Congressmen and Supreme Council member John Lentz by a unanimous joint meeting of the Supreme Council and Institute Trustees on Feb. 1. Mooseheart was dedicated on July 27, 1913. Vice President Thomas R. Marshall gave a speech for the occasion.

While Mooseheart began as a school, it soon grew to become a small incorporated village and hub of the organization, housing the headquarters of the LOOM, as well as the Women of the Moose. The population of Mooseheart would grow to 1,000 by 1920, reach a peak of 1,300 during the Great Depression and go down to approximately 500, the campus' current maximum capacity, in 1979.

In addition to Mooseheart, the LOOM also runs a retirement center, Moosehaven, located in Orange Park Florida. This project was inaugurated in the Autumn of 1922 with 26 acres of property and 22 retired Moose residents. It has grown to a 63-acre community with over 400 residents.

Organization

Local units are called "Lodges", state groups are "State Associations" and the national authority is the "Supreme Lodge of the World", which meets annually. In 1923 there were 1,669 lodges "promulgated in every civilized country controlled by the Caucasian race". In 1966 3,500 lodges were reported in every US state, Guam, Canada, Bermuda and England. In 1979 the Order had 36 State Associations and over 4,000 Lodges. Today it has 1,800 Lodges, in all 50 states and four Canadian provinces, as well as Bermuda and the United Kingdom.

The entire membership is sometimes referred to as the "Moose Domain".

Membership

Until at least the 1970s, membership was restricted to white men of "sound mind and body, in good standing in the community, engaged in lawful business who are able to speak and write the English language". In June 1972 the Supreme Court handed down a decision in the Order's favor, saying that a Moose Lodge in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, could not be denied a state liquor license because they refused to serve a black guest.

In the early 1920s the LOM reportedly had over half a million members with 32,570 in the Mooseheart Legion and 5,178 in the Junior Order of Moose. In 1928 this had grown to 650,000 members with 59,000 in the ladies' auxiliary. There were slightly more than a million in 1966. In 1979 the LOM had 1,323,240 members. In 2013 there were 800,000.

Benefits and philanthropy

The LOOM has historically supported numerous charitable and civic activities. It has sponsored medical research for muscular dystrophy, cerebral palsy, cancer and cardiology, as well as the March of Dimes. It has also supported Boy Scout and Girl Scout programs.

Independent, Benevolent and Protective Order of Moose

In 1925 the LOOM brought a suit against the Independent, Benevolent and Protective Order of Moose, an African American order. They attempted to obtain a legal injunction to keep them from using the Moose name, ritual, emblem and titles of its officers. The New York Court of Appeals restrained the African American order from using the name "Moose", but allowed them to continue using the same fraternal titles and colors. The I,BPOM was apparently an all woman order.

Religious objections

By 1966 the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod and the Wisconsin Synod forbade membership in the Loyal Order of Moose. The Catholic Church, however, has never explicitly objected to the Moose, despite having condemned similar organizations, such as the Freemasons for their oaths and other rituals.

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