That’s putting the odd in Odd Fellows

The Odd Fellows are one of those fraternal orders that just don’t seem to be front and center in the way they were in, say, 1890 or 1950. 

These days, we are way, way, way too jaded to join outfits that have secret rituals, goofy handshakes, strange titles like Chief Patriarch and Guardian of the Tent, and odd-ball costumes. Actually, other than those titles – which I nipped from Wikipedia – I don’t know if the Odd Fellows have any of that other “stuff.”

In truth, what I know about these fraternal orders was gleaned from Peggy Sue Got Married, when Peggy Sue crashes her grandfather’s Masons meeting, and from watching Amos and Andy (Mystic Knights of the Sea) and The Honeymooners (Raccoons) as a kid.

In other words, not much.

I do know they do good, and that some of them wear funny hats and drive tiny cars.

I would probably know more about them if my father had been a member of one of them. But the secret password and funny hats would not have been his cup of tea. Not to mention that I don’t believe that Catholics went in for organizations like the Masons, the Shriners, and the Odd Fellows.

The Elks must have let Catholics join, because the fathers of some of my friends belonged. But I don’t think the Elks had the sort of mumbo-jumbo that the Masons did. Perhaps the rituals of the Catholic Church – elaborate altars, ornate vestments, incense, Latin – satisfied the need. Or maybe it was just the opposite: the Masons craved the glitter and symbolism of Catholicism that the Reformation drummed out.  Anyway, my impression of the Benevolent Protective Order of Elks was that men went there for the bar.

It’s not the my father wasn’t a joiner.

He was a member of the Holy Name Society. I’m not sure what the point of that outfit was exactly, but they did golf on Saturdays, and my father was known as the only one who wouldn’t give the priests endless mulligans or gimme putts. But what the Holy Name did other than golf – and go to wakes: they went to a lot of wakes – I have no idea.

My father was also a long standing member of the St. Vincent de Paul Society, and I know what they did: they helped members of the parish who were in need. I remember him delivering shoes before the school year. We, of course, did not know who got the deliveries – that was all very hush-hush -  but it was pretty easy to guess. Even in a neighborhood where no one had all that much, you could figure out who the have-nots were – ramshackle houses, double-digit kids…

My father was also a member of the American Legion and the VFW. I know this because he got the magazines every month – boring stories about reunions, and really bad cartoons. He never went to the Legion Hall or the local VFW Post as far as I know.  He may even have dumped his Legion membership – I remember my mother telling me that he thought the organization was “off” (by which he meant too right-leaning and fascistic).

Anyway, once in a while I pass a building and see the letters IOOF carved on the lintel, and I know I’m passing an old Odd Fellows hall.

I don’t imagine there are a boat load of them around here. (There are some: The Grand Lodge of Massachusetts Independent Order of Odd Fellows even has a site.)

But it’s not the Massachusetts Odd Fellows that I’m finding odd these days. It’s their pals out in Iowa.

As the Council Bluffs Daily Nonpareil reported – and what I wouldn’t give to have the local newspaper be called the Nonpareil, an Odd Fellow placed a classified ad for an antique oak coffin on a stand – a coffin was already occupied by “a full set of skeletal remains.”

Dave Burgstrum of Council Bluffs posted the ad. Burgstrum said the coffin was used in a ritual conducted by the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, a fraternal organization that has a long history in Council Bluffs…It was used in initiation rituals as a representation of death. “All men are made equal,” he said. “Rich man or poor man, everybody will eventually die. So the lesson was to do as much good as you can while you are alive.” (Source: The Nonpareil.)

Well, having gone through parochial school, I don’t need the Independent Order of Odd Fellows to put me through any ritual that represents death. As if getting ashes each year weren’t enough – remember, OLA first grader, that dust thou art and unto dust thou shalt return – death was a constant companion, part of most lesson plans. Well, not quite. I don’t remember any arithmetic problems asking how to calculate the square inches of wood needed to build a 6 x 3 x 2 coffin – but any time that death (preferably ours) could be introduced into the pedagogical conversation, the better.

As for the IOOF, it’s apparent that the ranks of those who want these kinds of reminders are dying out. The Council Bluffs chapter was down to bare bones: Burgstrum, his wife, and his brother. And, I guess, whoever belongs to those “skeletal remains.”

The group had lost its charter, and was selling its coffin, along with other mementos – mori and otherwise – to pay off back taxes on their lodge building.

The coffin was the big memento kahuna. An antiques dealer estimated its worth at $12-15K (not sure if that’s fully loaded), enough to pay off those back taxes.

But now the Council Bluff PD’s involved.

Detective Michael Roberts said the remains could not be sold without an identification tag on them.

“If they had papers of origination, then they would be OK to own,” Roberts said.

But the provenance of the skeleton is lost in the mists of time. The story was that a doctor had used it to explain anatomy, and that somehow it had gotten into IOOF hands, and where better to place them bones than in a handy ritual coffin?

In fact, Burgstrum was selling the locked and loaded coffin precisely because he couldn’t figure out what else to do with the skeleton. You can’t exactly put them in a Hefty Bag and leave them on the curb. Well, I suppose you could if you weren’t the righteous type who joins the IOOF to begin with.

Anyhow, the state of Iowa’s Medical Examiner’s Office is now in on the act.

While they’re unlikely to be able to name names, they will be able to figure out race and gender, and

…if they are of Native American descent they will be returned to a Native American organization.

Other than that, what becomes of the coffin, the skeleton, and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, well, remains to be seen.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------No, I don’t normally read the Council Bluffs Nonpareil. I first read of this coffin-plus in an AP article on boston.com. It must be fun being an AP writer whose job it is to bring these bit o’ Americana stories to us.