Imposing Upon Masons, the Grand Army of the Republic, and Odd Fellows in 1898

The Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library's blog started sixteen years ago this month, with a post about Masonic impostors. Nearly every May since then, we have returned to the topic of Masonic impostors. This year, we are doing it once again.

Although we often write about Masonic impostors, Masons were not the only fraternal group that found themselves imposed upon by people pretending to be members in order to elicit charity. Because fraternal organizations supported their members who were in need, they also became targets of either con men or those in desperate situations, who would pretend to be members and impose upon a fraternity’s inclination to be charitable.

The circular pictured here was issued in 1898 by John W. Laflin, the Grand Secretary of the Grand Lodge of Wisconsin. The notice was likely sent to local Masonic lodges throughout the state and warns of a potential impostor – E.L. Martin, a.k.a. David C. Morgan – who claimed to be a Mason from Missouri, and may have made his way from South Dakota to Wisconsin. Laflin also notes that, in addition to pretending to be a Mason, Martin was also pretending to be a member of the Grand Army of the Republic and the Odd Fellows. In all three cases, Martin apparently presented himself to these three fraternal organizations for charity under false pretenses.

Notices like these were intended to warn others to be aware that they might encounter someone claiming to be a member and imposing upon a lodge’s charity. Because of this, names, lodge affiliations, and a physical description were often key to providing useful, identifiable information. While no photograph accompanies the notice, Laflin paints a vivid portrait of the Martin:

About sixty years of age, about six feet in height, slightly stooped, iron-gray beard, wart on inside corner left eye, eyes blood-shot and bulge slightly, smooth talker. Some teeth are gone causing lips to be slightly sunken.

If you want to learn more about Masonic impostors, including an answer to the question why would someone impersonate a Freemason?, be sure to check out our previous posts on Masonic imposters.

Caption:

Imposter announcement from Grand Secretary John W. Laflin, 1898 June 3. Museum purchase, A2022/202/001.

The Blog Turns 15! (And Yet Another Masonic Impostor)

The Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library's blog started fifteen years ago this month, with a post about Masonic impostors. Nearly every May since then, we have returned to the topic of Masonic impostors. This year is no exception. Pictured here is a detail from the June 1924 issue of the Official Warning Circular of The Masonic Relief Association of the United States and Canada.

The Masonic Relief Association of the United States and Canada began publishing the Official Warning Circular in 1886. The primary function of the circular was to try to prevent non-Masons from imposing on the charity of Masonic organizations and defrauding them out of their money. This was accomplished by a type of crowdsourcing: local Masonic organizations would share information about known imposters with the Masonic Relief Association who then, in turn, would share that information in their circulars throughout the U.S. and Canada, in an attempt to stay one step ahead of those who would travel from state to state, presenting themselves as Masons in need.

In some cases, these Masonic impostors appear to have fallen on hard times and were defrauding Masons out of desperation. In other cases, the impostors appear to be well-practiced con artists who presented themselves as Masons and told a convincing story in each new town and city.

This is quite evident with case number 7413, John J. McGettigan, pictured above. The description of McGettigan notes that he had used at least three different aliases and had been published in the circular before under different case numbers which cast light on earlier successful swindles. The description also contains details of some of McGettigan's previous brushes with the law, and that he was, at the time that the circular was published, wanted by the Solicitor General of Atlanta, Georgia.

McGettigan, it turns out, may have been part of a larger confidence game - that is, an attempt to defraud people after first gaining their trust. In 1925, McGettigan's capture was front page news in the June 4, 1925 edition of the Sioux City Journal. In the article, pictured above, McGettigan is described as having been one of five "leaders in confidence games of national scope" who was captured as part of a coordinated effort in Chicago, Illinois.

If you want to learn more about Masonic impostors, be sure to check out all of our previous posts on the topic.

A United Order True Sisters Anniversary Medal

United Order True Sisters Medal, ca. 1946. Gift of Clara W. Gnerre on behalf of Noemi No. 11. 91.032.1

The face of this round medal bears an embossed wreath which curves around the black enamel letters U, O, T, and S. These initials represent Unabhängiger Orden Treue Schwestern or United Order True Sisters, a German Jewish fraternal group which was the first independent national women’s organization in the United States. The group – sometimes known as the United Order of True Sisters - was founded in New York City in 1846 and became known for their charitable fundraising for cancer patients and children’s hospitals after World War II. The Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library cares for a small collection of UOTS items, including this medal, which is connected to a fascinating Massachusetts woman.

The items in this collection were donated by Clara Cecile Wagner Gnerre (1920 - 2005) on behalf of her UOTS chapter, Noemi No. 11. This chapter was founded in 1878 in Boston, Massachusetts – the eleventh UOTS lodge in the country - and like its sister chapters in other states, sought to provide Jewish women with a sense of identity, purpose, and community. Due to anti-German sentiment during World Wars I and II and American antisemitism throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, women who joined UOTS may not have felt welcome in other fraternal orders. As past museum Assistant Director Barbara Franco has written of Jewish fraternal orders, “The rites, regalia, and mottoes of these organizations, based on Freemasonry and Odd Fellowship, offered an American aura that might be denied Jews elsewhere.”

United Order True Sisters Medal, ca. 1946. Gift of Clara W. Gnerre on behalf of Noemi No. 11. 91.032.1.

The reverse of the medal reads “PRESENTED AT THE CENTENNIAL ANNIVERSARY 1846-1946”. To commemorate their one-hundredth anniversary, UOTS chapters produced souvenir medals like these, as well as centennial calendars and other ephemera. A February 1946 article from the Daily Argus (Westchester, New York) shows the kind of activities UOTS chapters were involved in that year. Activities included mahjong games, luncheons, educational lectures, and Red Cross sewing drives. The United States Treasury Department awarded a citation to Westchester No. 34 for raising nearly a quarter of a million dollars in war loan drives. After the war, in 1947, the UOTS formed a National Cancer Service initiative. This program funneled members’ fundraising skills and largesse towards medical charities.

Clara Wagner – later Clara Gnerre - was a member of Noemi No. 11 for forty years. She graduated from Girl’s Latin School in 1937 and attended Radcliffe College, where she graduated cum laude with a degree in chemistry in 1941. If she was a member of Noemi in 1946, she may have received this souvenir UOTS medal when it was first issued, when she was 26 years old.

She worked first for Carbon Black Co. as a rubber chemist and was employed there in 1950 when she married her husband C. Gerald “Jerry” Gnerre. A January 1954 Boston Globe article described her as a “research chemist and rubber technologist” at Godfrey L. Cabot, Inc. Research Laboratories on Cambridge’s “Research Row.” Gnerre was, at the time, one of few women working in industrial materials research and development, a growing field post-World War II in Cambridge.

In the 1980s, Gnerre became more active in Noemi No. 11, serving as its Recording Secretary in 1986 and President from 1987 to 1988. At this time, the chapter focused on fundraising for cancer services and children’s care at Boston’s Children’s and Massachusetts General Hospitals. At Noemi’s 110th Annual Luncheon, Gnerre was praised for her “warmth, encouragement, and good humor.”

After 111 years as a United Order True Sisters chapter, Noemi No. 11 dissolved in 1989. Perhaps inspired by a 1983 chapter visit to the then-eight-year-old Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library, Gnerre first donated a collection of material from the chapter to the museum in 1991. This medal was the first item that she donated. Over the next five years, Gnerre and other women from Noemi No. 11 donated UOTS material to the Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library, as well as to other historic repositories (see link below).

Clara Cecile Wagner Gnerre died in August 2005. Her Boston Globe obituary reads: “In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to The United Order of True Sisters, Inc. . . . where she was a member for 40 years and past President of a local chapter (Noemi Chapter 11) or to a cancer organization of your choice.” Gnerre ably represented the United Order True Sisters and their philanthropic goals to the last.

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Further Reading:

• United Order True Sisters Noemi #1 Records at Wyner Family Jewish Heritage Center, New England Historic Genealogical Society

"Bogus Mason Was Locked Up": Masonic Impostor Duncan C. Turner

Long-time readers of our blog will know that every May we return to the topic of our very first blog post: Masonic impostors. This year we focus on a man named Duncan C. Turner (born ca. 1847), who was featured in the 1903 booklet, Album of Masonic Impostors. He was previously published in the Masonic Relief Association's Official Warning Circular No. 147. The Album of Masonic Impostors' description of Turner is brief and to the point:

"Alias McNeill. Acacian Lodge No. 705, Ogdensburg, N.Y. Served time in prison."

An article published in the Buffalo Courier newspaper on November 14, 1897 makes it clear that the circulars published by the Masonic Relief Association worked. The newspaper recounts how Turner's profile was published in recent issues of the monthly Official Warning Circular - first showing up in the July 1897 issue. The article continues, noting that a "more recent letter announced that he [i.e. Turner] had been arrested in Cleveland and sentenced to the workhouse for sixty days, for working his swindle in that city. He recently regained his liberty and a still later [note in the Association's] circular stated that he was on his way East, all Relief Boards being instructed to keep a sharp lookout for him."

The article also reports how it was that Turner was apprehended in Buffalo by a Mason who had, indeed, kept a sharp lookout for him. After having met a local Mason, Henry Cutting, in town, Turner claimed that he had just arrived in Buffalo and had "fallen into a little ill luck." Cutting gave him the business address of Charles F. Sturm, who ran a furniture store in Buffalo and was the secretary of Buffalo's Masonic Board of Relief, which coordinated Masonic charity in the city. Turner made his way to Sturm's furniture store and "told Mr. Sturm a pitiful tale, which he concluded with an appeal for enough money to take him to New York." The article continues, noting Sturm's reaction to having a known impostor present himself to him: "On hearing the man's name, Mr. Sturm almost leaped from his seat in surprise." The article notes that Sturm called the police, who arrested Turner, "who was charged with being a tramp."

The Buffalo Courier reported about Turner's appearance in court on November 14. At that hearing, it was revealed that Turner had defrauded Masons in Briar Hill, NJ, Toronto, and Cleveland. The judge noted that Turner had already served sixty days in the Cleveland Workhouse for "obtaining money from Masons in that city by fraudulent pretense. The judge in the Buffalo courtroom sentenced Turner to sixty days in the penitentiary. At the sentencing, the judge declared that Turner "was the greatest liar with whom he had come in contact during his career as a dispenser of justice."

Want to read more about Masonic impostors? Be sure to check out all of our previous posts on the topic.

 

"William Maxwell": One of the Most Dangerous Frauds at Large

Portrait of "William Maxwell" from Album of Masonic Impostors, 1903.

Each year in May, we return to the topic of Masonic impostors, which we covered in our first blog post back in 2008.

This year we present a man called William Maxwell, who was featured in the 1903 booklet, Album of Masonic Impostors. He was previously published in the Masonic Relief Association's Official Warning Circular No. 209. The Album colorfully describes him as having changed "his name and the Lodge he claims membership in, as easy as a rapid change artist in a vaudeville show." The description also suggests that Maxwell knew what cities and towns to avoid, stating, "Since we first published him he did a big business where our circulars do not reach."

Portrait of George Fleming from January 23, 1898 edition of The Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

 

In January 1898, Maxwell - whose real name appears to have been George Fleming - was arrested in Seattle, Washington, and convicted of obtaining money under false pretenses. He was sentenced to two and a half years in prison. The January 23, 1898 edition of The Seattle Post-Intelligencer carried a front-page article about Fleming titled "Bled Masons for Eight Years: George Fleming Confesses to a Long Career of Crime." In the continuation of the article, on page 7, an illustration of Fleming makes it clear that the "William Maxwell" pictured above and the George Fleming convicted in Seattle are the same person. Fleming claimed a number of different aliases and boasted of having made of career out of defrauding Masons and taking their money. By way of showing how successful he was at posing as a Mason, Fleming claimed to have duped Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, who was then the Grand Master of the United Grand Lodge of England out of $150 while dining with him in Paris.

Although the article mentions various aliases used by Fleming during his eight years of swindling, one name, "William Maxwell," is conspicuously absent. It seems likely that this was a new alias that Fleming began using after having been released from prison. If Fleming served the entirety of his two-and-a-half-year term, he would have been released in the summer of 1900. Existing evidence suggests that it did not take him long to resume his career as a Masonic impostor.

For example, the 1903 Proceedings of the Grand Lodge of Nebraska mention Maxwell and their encounter with him, calling him "one of the most dangerous frauds at large." A brief entry in the Omaha Daily Bee for January 28, 1903 reads, "William Maxwell, the alleged Masonic fraud, has left for parts unknown." It is unclear where Fleming/Maxwell went after leaving Omaha or when he died.

If you want to read more about Masonic impostors, be sure to check out all of our previous posts on the subject.

Masonic Impostors, or, You've Been Warned: "Beware of This Moocher"

The Album of Masonic Impostors was the subject of our very first blog post, back in May 2008. Each May, we revisit the subject of Masonic impostors to celebrate another year of blogging at the Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library.

This year, we feature the front page of The Bulletin of the Masonic Relief Association of the United States and Canada, No. 630, from November 1946. The entire page focuses on Fred Coopey, a Masonic impostor with at least seventeen aliases listed. As with many Masonic impostors, what little I was able to find about Coopey suggests that he was living a hard knock life early on. The 1920 U.S. Census lists a Fred Coopey, born the same year as the Bulletin's Coopey, as being a 17-year-old inmate at the New Jersey State Home for Boys in Jamesburg.

In just a few words, the Masonic Relief Association's Bulletin paints a picture of a man who has traveled far and wide, using a number of different aliases, and who has imposed on the charity of Freemasons along the way. The inclusion of fingerprints suggests prior criminal behavior on the part of Coopey.  

If you want to learn more about Masonic imposters, including an answer to the question why would someone impersonate a Freemason?, be sure to check out our previous posts on Masonic imposters.

Lecture: “The Boston Red Cross in the 1918-19 Influenza Pandemic: Vanguard Fighter or Rogue Chapter?”

October 17, 2015

2 p.m.

Lecture by Marian Moser Jones, Assistant Professor, University of Maryland, Department of Public Health

As World War I drew to a close, a new crisis appeared at home: the worldwide influenza pandemic had reached American shores. In August of 1918 the first influenza cases began to appear in sailors stationed in Boston Harbor. Within months the disease spread across the country sickening as many at 25 million Americans and killing over 550,000 of them. With most nurses still overseas and local authorities overwhelmed, the government turned to the Red Cross to care for the sick.  Boston’s local Red Cross chapter acted quickly to meet the needs of the emergency. However, once the Red Cross National Headquarters stepped in to call the shots, the headstrong Boston chapter ignored or rejected their directives. 

In this, the fourth of a five part series exploring The U.S. Home Front During World War I, the Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library has invited noted scholar Marian Moser

Jones, Assistant Professor at the University of Maryland School of Public Health, to explore the Red Cross-led response to the 1918-1919 flu in Boston and New England, and discuss whether the local officials acted wisely in charting their own course during this deadly public health crisis.

This lecture is made possible by the generous support of the Ruby W. and LaVon P.  Linn Foundation and is part of the lecture series, “The U.S. Home Front during World War I: Duty Sacrifice, and Obligation.”

References:

Jones, Marian Moser. The American Red Cross: from Clara Barton to the New Deal. (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013).

How to Catch Masonic Impostors Using Index Cards

The Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library's blog turns seven years old this month! As in years past, we celebrate the anniversary of our blog by revisiting the topic of our very first post: Masonic impostors.

Pictured above is the back page of the November 1933 (No. 552) Bulletin of the Masonic Relief Association of the United States and Canada, which explains how the Masonic Service Association distributed index cards of people known to impose upon Masonic relief boards for charity under false pretenses so that local boards of relief could compile an index of known "crooks and impostors."

Be sure to read all of our previous posts on Masonic impostors for more information about why someone would impersonate a Mason and how the Masonic Service Association and local Masonic relief boards attempted to detect those trying to defraud them.

 

Five years of blogging - and another Masonic impostor

Our blog turns five years old this month and, in keeping with our previous anniversary posts, we take yet another look at a Masonic impostor.

This year we feature Albert B. Engle. The brief description under his photograph in the Album of Masonic Impostors reads, in part, "It was with the greatest of difficulty we obtained even this picture. In his tramping about, is accompanied by two sons. He has served several sentences for obtaining money from Masons by false pretences."

The October 1902 issue of the Quarterly Bulletin of the Iowa Masonic Library featured a short article on Engle, titled "An Imposter in Iowa," which reported that Engle had been active in Nebraska, Kansas, and Missouri. The Bulletin article reports that he was arrested and charged with obtaining money under false pretences. (You can read the whole article here.)

Engle appears to have been active - and on the move - for quite some time. A Los Angeles newspaper item from 1909 - seven years after the Iowa article mentioned above - reported that Albert B. Engle and his sons, Henry and William, had been sent to the county workhouse for vagrancy. The article states that "According to Detectives Boyd and Jones, who made the arrests, the trio have been beating their way from eastern cities to Los Angeles on the plea that they are Masons who had been held up and robbed of all their money and playing upon the sympathies of Masons for financial reasons. (You can read the whole article here.)

If you want to learn more about Masonic impostors and the Album of Masonic Impostors, just check out our previous posts on the topic, which we link to in the first paragraph above.

Caption:
[Portrait of Albert B. Engle, in] General Masonic Relief Association of the United States and Canada. Album of Masonic Impostors. New York: Press of Eclipse Printing Co., 1903.
Call number: 19.78 .A345 1903

Baseball Players Cannot Be Beavers: Fraternal Benefit Societies

Fraternal life insurance companies occupy their own niche in the life insurance market today. All trace their roots back to the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, when hundreds of mutual benefit societies were formed in order to provide death benefits and life insurance to individuals who joined. Most of these organizations had initiation rituals which were later dropped as these fraternal organizations morphed into more traditional life insurance companies.

Life insurance companies are, naturally, risk averse. And they were back when they existed as mutual benefit societies. The 1907 Constitution and By-Laws of the Beavers' Reserve Fund Fraternity (pictured here), a mutual benefit society established in Stoughton, Wisconsin in 1902, made it clear that people whose occupations were dangerous were disqualified from being members. Here's Section 9 of the By-Laws:

No person engaged in any of the following occupations shall become a beneficial member of the Fraternity:

Railroad conductor, brakeman, switchman, fireman or locomotive engineer; miner employed underground; mine inspector or mine tracklayer; pit boss; professional rider or driver in races; professional baseball or football player, aeronaut; sailor on the Great Lakes or seas; engineer or fireman on any steamer; plow polisher, plow grinder; submarine operator; paid fireman in any city of more than fifteen thousand inhabitants; empoyee in slag furnace or lead works; soldier in the regular army or in time of war; employee in any factory where gunpowder, nitroglycerine, dynamite or any other dangerous explosive is manufactured; glass blower, oil well "shooter," brass finisher, steel blaster, professional nurse, employee in color or white lead factory, circus equestrian or trapeze performer.

The list is both a chilling reminder of some dangerous occupations (oil well "shooters") and also contains some reminders that even the whimsical-sounding jobs (trapeze performer) are there for a reason.

As for the Beavers' Reserve Fund Fraternity, it was established in Stoughton, Wisconsin in 1902. In 1912, the organization changed its name to Beavers National Mutual Benefit. In 1931, they dropped "Beavers" from the name and simply became National Mutual Benefit, the name they still go by today.

Today, the Bureau of Labor Statistics keeps track of occupational injuries and fatalities [pdf], which you might be more familiar with as a news story about the most dangerous jobs in America.

Stay tuned for more on the Beavers in an upcoming post.

Constitution and By-Laws of the Beavers Reserve Fund Fraternity, Adopted by Grand Colony. (Mount Morris, IL: Press of Kable Brothers Company, [1907])
Call number: HS1510 B42 1906
Gift of Michael T. Heitke