The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1895-09-09
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Fellowship is so closely allied with
! that remarkable man Thomas Wildey.
that the following synopsis of his life,
! compiled from eulogy to his memory,
I delivered by James S. Rldgely, p. g. s.
! of the S. G. L., is of much interest:
Thomas Widely was born in London,
England, January Is, 1888. AT IA years
| of age he was apprenticed to a coach
smith. When q years old he was in
ttiated into lodge No. II Of the .. of
O. F., in London, and served with such
ability and zeal as ITO win the hearty
approval Of his brethren by the time
ne was g. Three years after his mi
tiation he was instrumental in organ
izing Morning Star lodge No. IS, in the
outskirts Of the city, that he might eX-
tend the benefits and influence OF the
order. He was unanimously chosen its
! first presiding officer, and during the
next ten years of his membership filed
that chair three times. These lodges
were self-1nstituted the Manchester
Unity not having then been organized
He embarked for America July 80
1917, reaching Baltimore September 2,
where he soon found employment at
his trade. Within the next eighteen
months, with the assistance of three
other Odd Fellows, he had the felicity
o.. l..
stituted.
In 1926 Wildey visited England and
instructed the Odd Fellows there in
the Covenant and Remembrance de-
grees, which they adopted, and the
grand lodge degree, which they de-
clined, as not necessary in their or
ganization
Encampments were yet unknown.
The patriarchal and royal purple de-
grees. received about this time, were,
like the golden rule degree, conferred
on P. G's only in grand lodges. On
June IA, 1927, Jerusalem Encampment
No. 1, was Instituted by the G. L. of
Maryland, with Brother Wildey, its
originator, as chief patriarch with
power to confer the sublime degrees
on scarlet degree members. And while
laboring at home for the improvement
Of the order, he travelled and toiled for
its extension and welfare abroad.
Without stint of money or of time
he made official visits to state grand
lodges instituted subordinate lodges
and encampments in new states, in
structed the brethren, adjusted con-
hlcts, and stilled dissensions. He
carried the order into Delaware, Ohio.
kentucky, Louisiana, and Virginia
everywhere a master spirit of fra
ternity and benevolence.
From 1926 to 1883 he served as grand
sire, and afterwards, gratuitously, as
general agent. Ia this capacity he
visited the northern and eastern states
In 1888, Virginia in 1897, Pennsylvania,
Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana.
Mississippi, Alabama, Illinois, Mis-
souri, and Iowa in 1888, and Tennessee,
Arkansas and Texas in 1889; travels
then often toilsome and costly. Thus
he added state after state to the order.
and bound them by the strongest ties
in fraternal union.
throughout his whole career as an
Odd Fellow, private interests. health.
comfort worldly advantage in all--its
forms were surrendered to the work
which he loved and cherished with
devotion that never wavered, but that
as age advanced upon him and in
hrmlt1es increased, became more and
more intense. Thus loving and be-
loved, he went gently and peacefully
down the declivity of life to the
boundary river, and at the ripe. old
age OF 81, passed into Immortality on
the 18th Of October, 1861.
In January, 1865, the city authorities
of Baltimore granted site on the
corner of Broadway and Fayette
street, upon which the Odd Fellows of
the whole country contributed for and
erected a magnificent monument
where, at a height of fifty-two feet,
towers a ife-size figure of Charity.
protecting orphans
The order of Odd Fellows. as
founded by Wildey, was simply a hui
name institution; its main objects
were TO relieve the brethren, bury the
dead, and care for the widow and Or
phan. But gradually there was in
FUSED into its lectures and charges
much moral and unsectarian religious
instruction, and at each revision these
principles were increased, and deep-
ened, and strengthened, until its bene-
nclal and relief measures. from being
ENDS, have become means to a higher
and greater end-''to improve and ele-
waite the character of man; to imbue
MIN with conceptions of his cana bilitv
for good; to enlighten his mind: to en-
large the sphere of his affections. and
thus to lead him to the cultivation of
the true fraternal relations designed
by the great author of his being"
This is the third of the series of
condensed history of early Odd Fel-
lowship. The subject will be continued
as opportunity offers.