Odd Fellows

Here's my first draft of a TinWiki entry on the Odd Fellows. There's still plenty of room for improvement, which i will address in the coming weeks.

tinwiki.org...

I know of one fellow that was once odd... ok he is still alittle odd, but i digress.

He didnt say much, but stated that he left the lodge because he felt they were to cliqueish.

I am a member of the Rebekahs as well as a former Theta Rho girl. I have been in the Order since I was 12 so that makes it 20 years. Anyway, as a Theta Rho girl I was involved in many community activities such as highway clean ups, serving at teas and helping our Rebekah sisters when ever we can. The Oddfellows and Rebekahs offer many scholarships for students and they also have a Pilgrimage for Youth to the UN in New York of which I was a lucky participant.

My Rebekah Lodge is involved in planning birthday parties for the personal care home that we run, raising money and awareness for the Artiritis Society. We also have a Memorial Eye Fund which raises money to purchase equipment for hospitals to help with eye care. We also do vision screening in the schools. Many of our members knit mittens and scarves for the needy school kids. At Christmas we raise money and provide hampers for needy families in the community. We also provide luncheons for the funerals of members and their family.

The majority of our members are reaching the age of 80 and we are having a hard time finding younger members. Some of the rules are pretty strict and a lot of these older ladies don't seem to understand that us younger ladies (I'm 33) have full time jobs that take us outside of the home and have small children. When I was Noble Grand (AKA President) I had a 2 year old and a six month old which made it very difficult to meet my obligations. Most of the ladies understood that but there were a few that made it known that they weren't impressed. I guess there's a few in any group!

Anyway, that's a brief outline of my life with the IOOF. If anyone has any questions please feel free to ask! Oh and for the record, we do like to go out and have a few drinks. Some of those sweet, little old ladies are not as sweet as they would like you to believe!

"Some of those sweet, little old ladies are not as sweet as they would like you to believe!"... now when i first discovered this i almost fell out of my seat... it really took me for a loop. Shows you how much women have been conditioned to present themselves as saints, when reality suggests otherwise

One question does occur to me, that i find peculiar... or maybe i'm just confused... since 2001 Rebekahs are now allowed to join the Odd Fellows but the odd fellows are not allowed to join the Rebekahs? or do i have this mixed up?

Oddfellows have always been able to be Rebekahs. The men could come to our meetings even if they were not members but the women couldn't go to theirs. Now you can belong to either.

Yes, those proper ladies are not always so proper! I'm not going to lie, I had a 70 year old lady drink me under the table when I was in my early 20s. Some of those ladies are hard core! The best was the night a few of the "White Hairs" were talking about some of the retreats they had been on. They needed extra bags for their booze, one lost her nightie! They had me cracking up!

Hi, I am a member of IOOF in Denmark. In my lodge while being inside the main lodge hall it is strictly "old fashion". We all wear "pinguin suits" when there is degree works etc.
There isnt a lot of secrets etc., only the "theater play" is secret for those not having the degree and ofcourse the passwords. The youngest of age is 29. I think the average of age is 55 or 60.
I can see that especially the oldest members are very good to care of each other when one of them are sick or need help.
The danish odd fellows are very strict about keeping it to the old code. But more open to the public.
There was a television program on the freemasons in denmark. And from that I could see that the odd fellows and freemasons in demark do the almost exact stuff. We just dont wear high hats.
I remember the day of my initiation. The lodge master said if I joined because I was curious or if I thought that I would get richer from joining the odd fellows I would be very disapointed. He was right :-) !!!
I mean it's a mens club dealing with caretaking of eachother and giving money for aid. And ofcourse you get a lot of friends just like in any chess or sportsclub...
Sorry there are no ugly conspiracys