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Secret Societies & Fraternal Orders
The two townships never seated a lodge of their own. That is the first finding of this section, and it is a finding, not an absence of digging: the township chapters of both county histories were read whole and searched, and they name churches, schools, mills and cemeteries — and no lodge, chapter, tent, camp or tribe. What the townships did have was members: Clay and Harris farmers who rode to South Bend, to Mishawaka, to New Carlisle and across the Michigan line to Edwardsburg to sit in lodges there. So the census that follows is a census of the two cities' bodies and the out-of-county seats township men actually joined, with the township membership ground proven man by man, and the present-day close in the last article reads the locators as of November 2026.
The dated census: Chapman 1880, the 1883 directory, Howard 1907 — and the two townships' negative, read whole
1880–1907 · Mishawaka and South Bend (boundary); Clay and Harris townships
Chapman, 1880 — Mishawaka's own section. Chapman gives Mishawaka a headed "SECRET SOCIETIES" section (pp. 796–797), and it is short: "The Freemasons and Odd Fellows have a fine, well-furnished hall in the third story of the…
The first lodge whole, and the two out-of-county seats township men actually joined
26 May 1852 – November 2026 · Mishawaka, New Carlisle, Edwardsburg (Michigan)
Mishawaka Lodge No. 130. The first lodge whole is Mishawaka's: organized 26 May 1852, A. L. 5852, with the organization officers Chapman and Howard agree on word for word — R. S. Alden, W.M.; D. H. Smith, S.W.; J. Holdridge…
The bodies around the lodge: Royal Arch, commandery, Eastern Star — and the chapter number that prints two ways
1855–2014 · Mishawaka and South Bend (boundary)
The Royal Arch chapter — a conflict, printed whole. Howard's own Mishawaka societies list (1907, p. 345) gives the Royal Arch body as "Mishawaka Chapter No. 83," with Tabor Ham, H.P., and John W. Hutchinson, secretary. A second…
Odd Fellows in full: the two Mishawaka lodges, the South Bend lodges, and the Rebekahs
c. 1843–2001 · Mishawaka and South Bend (boundary)
Mishawaka. St. Joseph Lodge No. 27, I.O.O.F., was organized about 1843 — among its members Dr., afterwards Colonel, Norman Eddy, John Niles, Albert Cass, Harris E. Hurlbut, A. H. Long and James Easton — and "was afterwards…
Knights of Pythias whole: the lodge, the Uniform Rank, and the Sisters' temple — named where the record names one
1880–1907 · Mishawaka and South Bend (boundary)
The lodge. In 1880 Chapman could say only that "There is also a lodge of the Knights of Pythias, of recent organization in Mishawaka" — no number, no name. By 1907 Howard names it: Knights of Pythias, Mishawaka Lodge No. 453…
The Red Men: the tribe by number, the borrowed names stated plainly, the wigwam unnamed
1907 · Mishawaka and South Bend (boundary)
The tribe. Mishawaka Tribe No. 304, Improved Order of Red Men, stands in Howard's 1907 Mishawaka list with its officers named: John C. Quick, sachem; George Hitesman, secretary. In South Bend, Howard's closing sweep names Montauk…
The assessment-insurance alphabet: tents, hives, camps, groves and courts as a benefit machine — and the Grange line
1880–1907 · Mishawaka and South Bend (boundary); the townships
The mechanism, explained once. Most of the bodies in this article are not lodges in the Masonic sense but assessment-benefit societies: workingmen's mutual insurers wearing fraternal dress. The member paid small dues and a…
The Catholic orders as a suite: Knights of America, Foresters, the Legion and Columbia lines — and the Knights of Columbus on Granger ground
1885 – November 2026 · South Bend and Mishawaka (boundary); Granger
The older suite, 1907. Howard's rosters carry the Catholic orders as a suite, not a single entry. In Mishawaka: Catholic Order of Foresters, St. John's Court No. 952, and the Sacred Heart Court, its women's court; Catholic…
The unchartered form: the ethnic brotherhood circle that never chartered — tested negative, searches shown
1880–1907, searches run November 2026 · Clay and Harris townships
The test. The row asks for the unchartered form — the ethnic brotherhood circle that never took a charter, on the DeAmicis / DiLoreto pattern — printed at its record size. The searches ran whole: (1) Chapman's Clay and Harris…
Later Orders: Moose, Eagles, Prince Hall and the Klan Era
1856–2025 · South Bend and Mishawaka (boundary); the two townships
Prince Hall — the premise fails at city level. The row's negative test came back positive for the county, and it prints as a positive: the Most Worshipful Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Indiana's affiliate record lists St. Peters…
What stands, dated: the November 2026 close
As of November 2026 · locators and lodge records read November 2026
Meeting now. Council Oak Lodge No. 745, F. & A.M., chartered 1966, at 19780 Brick Road, South Bend, IN 46637 (the lodge's own site) — the modern lodge seated nearest the CDP's Clay Township side. St. Joseph Lodge No. 45, the…