Fraternal Societies

City Cemetery, Seymour, Indiana

City Cemetery, Seymour, Indiana

WILLIAM D.

BLYTHE

BORN

OCT. 8, 1814

DIED

JUNE 2, 1877

The Monumental Bronze Company of Bridgeport, Connecticut, offered customers many symbols that could be bolted into place on the zinc markers they produced, including symbols that represented fraternal societies that were very popular.  The marker above at the City Cemetery at Seymour, Indiana, displays a symbol of three links of chain, one of the most recognized symbols of the Odd Fellows.

Odd Fellows is an fraternal organization that formed in England in the 1700s as a service organization.  The American association was founded in Baltimore, Maryland, on April 26, 1819.

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1 Response to Fraternal Societies

  1. : The symbol to the right is Jr. Order of United American Mechanics, and the center is the All-Seeing Eye and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows (many fraternal organizations used the all-seeing eye as a symbol, usually representing God). [Check out my archives or use the search function to learn more about Jr. OUAM and IOOF] But I am not sure about the one on the left. It could be a crown, or maybe a triangle with rays. Either have roots in Freemasonry, with the crown being part of the Masonic branch of the Order of Knights Templar (but it usually is accompanied by a cross also). The triangle represents the Trinity/God but there is normally many rays around it, not just two.

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