The Order of the Arrow (OA), previously known as Wimachtendienk Wingolauchsik Witahemui (WWW) is the honor society of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA), composed of Scouts and Scouters who best exemplify the Scout Oath and Law in their daily lives as elected by their peers. Started as a Camp Fraternity by E. Urner Goodman, with the assistance of Carroll A. Edson, in 1915, its goal was to reinforce the Scout Oath and the Scout Law. Started without approval of Boy Scouts of America (BSA), it became an "Official Experiment" of the Scouting organization. In 1948, following an extensive review, it officially became a program of Boy Scouts of America.
A benefit society, fraternal benefit society, fraternal benefit order, friendly society, or mutual aid organization is a voluntary association formed to provide mutual aid, benefit, for instance insurance for relief from sundry difficulties. Such organizations may be formally organized with charters and established customs or may arise ad hoc to meet the unique needs of a particular time and place.
The P.E.O. Sisterhood is a U.S.-based international women's organization of about 197,000 members, with a primary focus on providing educational opportunities for female students worldwide. The Sisterhood is headquartered in Des Moines, Iowa, with chapters throughout the United States and Canada. Among other projects, it owns and supports Cottey College, an independent college for women in Nevada, Missouri.
While many Christian denominations either allow or take no stance on their members joining Freemasonry, others discourage or prohibit their members from joining the fraternity.
The Third Order of Saint Dominic, also referred to as the Lay Fraternities of Saint Dominic or Lay Dominicans since 1972, is a Catholic third order which is part of the Dominican Order.
The North American fraternity and sorority system began with students who wanted to meet secretly, usually for discussions and debates not thought appropriate by the faculty of their schools. Today they are used as social, professional, and honorary groups that promote varied combinations of community service, leadership, and academic achievement.
A fraternity or fraternal organization is an organization, society, club or fraternal order traditionally of men but also women associated together for various religious or secular aims. Fraternity in the Western concept developed in the Christian context, notably with the religious orders in the Catholic Church during the Middle Ages. The concept was eventually further extended with medieval confraternities and guilds. In the early modern era, these were followed by fraternal orders such as Freemasons, the Rosicrucian Society of England, and Odd Fellows, along with gentlemen's clubs, student fraternities, and fraternal service organizations. Members are occasionally referred to as a brother or – usually in a religious context – frater or friar.
Grace Webster Hinsdale was an American author whose early development of a religious temperament prompted her most successful literary work. Both of her books, Coming to the King: a Book of Daily Devotions for Children and Thinking Aloud, were first published in 1865. She was a contributor for about 30 years to periodicals, principally verses, but also short sketches. Hinsdale died in 1902.
American Society for the Education of Pious Youth for the Gospel Ministry was organized in 1815 for the purpose of raising funds for college expenses of young men aiming to become Protestant clergymen. It was renamed American Education Society (AES) in 1820, It was formed under a deep conviction that there was a deficiency of well qualified Protestant ministers, and that no method of supplying this deficiency appeared to be so effectual as that of educating, for the ministry, young men of suitable character who did not the means of educating themselves. Later name changes included American College and Education Society (1874) and Congregational Education Society (1894).
Church Association for the Advancement of the Interests of Labor, commonly known as "CAIL", was an American Social Gospel organization founded in 1887, in New York City. It was organized by nine clergymen of the Protestant Episcopal Church. under the aegis of Bishop F. D. Huntington. From the beginning, CAIL recognized organized labor. Its declaration of principles stated that "God is the Father of all men and all men are brothers.. .. It is the duty of every man to labor diligently.. .. Labor should be the standard of social worth. When the divinely intended opportunity to labor is given to all men, one great cause of the present wide-spread suffering and destitution will be removed." The Association's official organ, Hammer and Pen, was for a long time the only church labor paper in the United States. CAIL also took an active interest in looking after the relations between the Church and the stage. The Association was one of the pioneer agencies in introducing arbitration of industrial disputes in this country and actively combated the sweat-shop system, notably in New York.
Augusta Merrill Hunt (1842–1932) was an American philanthropist, suffragist, and temperance leader. She was identified with many of the prominent charitable organizations of Portland, Maine, notably that of the Portland Fraternity, the Associated Charities, the Home for Aged Women, the Maine Woman's Suffrage Association (M.W.S.A.), and the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU). She was the first president of the Portland branch of the WCTU.
National Christian Association was an American organization opposed to secret societies. Headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, it consisted mostly of Protestant ministers of various denominations. It was the only society in the U.S. which has for its avowed object to "expose, withstand, and remove secret societies." It was organized in 1868, soon after the close of the Civil War, when such Protestant leaders as Jonathan Blanchard, Philo Carpenter, Joseph Goodwin (J.G.) Terrill, Ezra A. Cook, Alexander McLeod Milligan, D. McDill, and others saw with alarm that "the convicted enemy of State and Church was creeping back into favor and power."
American Protestant Association was the oldest American, exclusively anti-Roman Catholic secret society. It is believed to have been the prototype of the American Protective Association. It was established at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and had five degrees, which, according to the Cyclopedia of Fraternities, "in connection with the personnel of its earlier membership, point to Orange sympathies." It is probable that American Protestant associations existed as long ago as the 1844, but it is also probable that the American Protestant Association was founded in 1849, because the "forty-fifth annual convention" of the Pennsylvania State Lodge was held at its natal city in 1895. The Association was active mainly in Pennsylvania. Its members were noted for their anti-Catholic tendencies. A schism, in 1884, gave rise to the "Order of American Freeman". The "Junior American Protestant Association", modelled probably after the original "junior order," that of the Sons of America, was founded in 1864, and like the Junior Order of United American Mechanics, afterwards declared its independence of the parent society, even going so far as to change its name, in 1890, to "Loyal Knights of America". A schismatic African-American branch of the American Protestant Association was formed in Pennsylvania, in 1849, and was still in existence in 1907.
Brotherhood of the Union was an American nativism secret society. It was organized in 1850, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, by George Lippard. Important planks in its platform were: antagonism to the union of Church and State; maintenance of the public school system; "America for Americans", and the restriction of immigration. Its chief officers were called, respectively, "Supreme Washington", "Supreme Jefferson", and "Supreme Franklin". There was an auxiliary or branch society known as the Home Communion, to which members of the Brotherhood and their women relatives were eligible. The Brotherhood flourished principally in the States of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Its membership was given as about 25,000 in 1907. While the Brotherhood was similar to the Order of United American Mechanics and the Patriotic Order Sons of America, it was the "premier nonpolitical land-reform organization of the 1850s".
Military Order of the Serpent was an American secret society and veterans' fraternity organized in 1904, and incorporated on August 6, 1907. The MOS received official recognition by the United Spanish War Veterans (USWV) at the Los Angeles encampment. It became the humorous branch of the USWV, as devotion to the principles and objectives of USWV did not prevent a belief in humor.
Christian Socialist Fellowship was an international religious society of Protestant ministers and other believers in Christian socialist principles. It was formed at Louisville, Kentucky, U.S. in 1906, for the purpose of "permeating the churches, denominations, and other religious institutions with the social message of Jesus; to show that Socialism is the necessary economic expression of the Christian life; to end the class struggle by establishing industrial democracy, and to hasten the reign of justice and brotherhood upon earth."
Knights of Reciprocity was an American semi-political secret society. Largely inspired by opposition to the Farmers' Alliance, it was organized in Garden City, Kansas, on November 26, 1890, by members of the Masonic Fraternity, Odd Fellows, and Knights of Pythias. The KofR was organized for the express purpose of aiding James G. Blaine to the Republican presidential nomination, and grew so rapidly that when the 1892 Republican National Convention was held in Minneapolis, the order had a membership in Missouri alone of over 20,000. With the defeat of Blaine, interest in the order lagged for a time, but after William Warner's nomination, the enthusiasm flamed up again.
Knights of the Globe was an American social, military, charitable, and patriotic secret organization organized in Freeport, Illinois in 1889. Its originator and founder was a dentist, Dr. William W. Krape, of Freeport, Illinois. The KG secured the death benefit feature to its members through the Knights of the Globe Mutual Benefit Association (KGMBA), a non-secret, cooperative insurance company. The KGMBA was later called the Cosmopolitan Life Insurance Company.
League of Friendship, Mechanical Order of the Sun was a fraternal beneficiary labor organization formed on April 30, 1868, at Meadville, Pennsylvania. From it sprang the Ancient Order of United Workmen (AOUW). The membership of the League was composed almost entirely of mechanics, engineers, firemen, and day laborers employed in the shops and on the lines of the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad, later known as Erie Railroad. Its object was "to advance and foster the interests of its members by cooperating in effort and financial assistance whenever called upon to serve a worthy and approved cause." To this pledge each member was bound by a solemn oath to be obedient and faithful. The League was governed by a "Grand Council", and the dissension which led to the resignation of "Father" John Jordan Upchurch and the other founders of the AOUW, and to the final disbanding of the League, October 27, 1868, was caused by a tax levied by that Council, which many members regarded as an imposition.
