Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 19, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 February 1898 — Odd Fellows Mutual [ARTICLE]

Odd Fellows Mutual

Fails With Liabilities of §IOO,OOO With Assetts of Only 83,81. The Odd Fellows Mutual Aid Association of Indiana, an assessment insurance concern, has closed its business, with liabilities of . about SIOO,OOO anti with $3.31 in the treasury for the liquidation of liabilities. The association simply died a natural death for want of support. About two years ago it was discovered that’the association was sixteen months behind in the payment of claims. All were then being paid in full. At the same time it was noted by the directors that the assessments, coming in would cause the association to get further and further behind all the time. It was decided that thereafter until the association might become stronger in membership, the monthly assessment should be prorated among beneficiaries. This course was followed. The membership kept falling off until there were only 250. The regular monthly meeting of members and of directors was to have been held last November, but there was but three present, one of them the president of the association. They declined to transact any business and the president wrote a letter to each of the members and to each of the beneficiaries, explaining the condition of affairs and asking for advice. There were less than a dozen reponses, and nothing was offered that would relieve the conditions. There has been no money collected or paid since then. The association was organized about thirty-five years ago. At a meeting at the Grand Lodge, I. O. O. F., a committee was appointed to suggest a plan for the organization of such an association and the committee recommended that an association be , organized entirely independent of the order. Several years ago there was quite a list of policy owners in this company here, but of these we are unable to find any who remained with the copcem to the end. They were astute enough “to see the wav things were going and got from under” as one ex-policy holder put it.