The Moose Lodge - Part 6, The Epilog

I went to Google Images while writing this article, hoping to find a photo of the lodge as it existed in its original condition. To my surprise, there was not a Moose Lodge listed in Kokomo. I did a Web search and found the building up for sale. I called the realtor and he told me the Lodge’s charter had been given up a couple years ago, the building was rented for a while, and a local restaurant had recently purchased it. I know comedians have mined a wealth of material from the quaint rituals, frocks and caps donned by members of the fraternal lodges. I know the Moose, Eagles, and Masons, etc., are vestiges of a bygone era, and the part played in society will not rise to the prominence once enjoyed. I know all things come to pass, but I can’t help feeling a twinge of sadness, and wonder that maybe, we have lost something of value, something that will not be easily replaced. THE END

The Moose Lodge - Part 5, The Tornado Aftermath

An eerie silence followed after the funnel passed. The surviving light fixtures swung listlessly, providing the sole animation to the shadowy scene. Don complained of pain in his side. I found a place for him to sit, and then went to survey the destruction.

The building resembled structures I’d seen in photos of bombed out cities. The glass doors behind me were the only survivors in the front area. Cool air circulated through the wreckage as I went out to the front, noticing the flag pole (above) was bent 30 degrees from the vertical. I didn’t stay long as a hail storm trailing the tornado began pelting me with golf ball sized projectiles.

I scurried around and found a flashlight behind the bar. Vehicles were beginning to move up and down Washington Street. I flashed the light toward them but got no response, and guessed they had more important things to do, or more likely, didn’t even see my faint signal.

Two of the outside walls of the office had blown outward causing the roof to collapse (above). The office doors were closed, there were no windows, and the vacuum of the funnel cloud had caused it to explode. Dad later said that it was lucky for him that he wasn’t there as he would probably have taken refuge in the office.

It was an eerie surprise to go into the kitchen at the back of the building; its was entirely intact, nothing out of place. The back windows had been left open (above) so air had vacated through them - no explosion.

Window frames at the windward front of the building were bend, curving inward (above). The frames on the leeward backside were blown out and lay on the ground (below). That included the window frame behind the stage area. It too had been ripped loose and the grand piano that sat on the stage was gone. The tables and chairs had been removed and replaced by new furniture - a mattress in one case. Mom‘s car was nowhere in sight.

A man and wife I’d seen at many moose activities drove into the parking lot while I was outside looking for Mom’s car. They were on their way home when the tornado crossed their path, forcing them to ride it out in the car. They were pretty shaken as the auto had been bounced around, even lifted off the ground at one point and carried to the other side of the road.

Mom and Dad were let into the area about a hour after the storm. They decided Don should go to the hospital, which was a good thing, as he had several broken ribs. They dropped me off at a temporary medical station on the way. I think it was on Markland Avenue near Washington Street. They had lots of things that needed attention so I told them I’d get home on my own once my cut finger got some stitches.

The waiting area of the station had several rows of folding chairs filled with people - all appeared to be in shock. Several canvas cubicles were aligned against a wall, a doctor worked behind each curtain. Most everybody seemed to be in worse shape than me so I sat over two hours as the room emptied. I spoke to the guy next to me. He sat, huddled with a blanket wrapped around his body. He said he and his wife had gotten under the bed, and the last thing he remembered was spinning around and around. He woke up in a field next to his house. He didn’t know what had happened to his wife.

I was the last to be called behind one of the curtains and there stood John Hutto, a former high school class mate who I had not seen since our graduation. We exchanged mutual histories of our intervening years while he sutured the “V” cut at the side of my middle finger. He was about to complete med-school, and that night was possibly his first real experience at doctoring. I think that I was one of his first stitching jobs, and noticed his hands were shaking more than mine. He did well. We parted and I never saw him again.

I walked the three miles home, getting there after two in the morning. I don’t remember that I slept that night as adrenalin continued to surge. I took several showers over the next few days because I’d find grit and sand under my finer nails when ever I scratched my head.

I worked for the Moose all of the following week. Dad hired me and my truck to be available for odd jobs during cleanup. Mom’s car sat in an adjacent field a hundred yards north of the lot - a total loss. It had been picked up, carried, and dashed to the ground several times. I found a perfect imprint of the front grill and headlights stamped into the soft soil. Further on there was a big gash in the newly plowed field where the car had landed on its side. It sat upright facing the direction from which it had blown. It was rumpled but intact. The piano was fragmented, and scattered over the field and beyond.

The night’s event became known as the Palm Sunday Tornado. It was actually a series of 47 tornados, the second biggest outbreak in history. The funnels passed through six Midwestern states: Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan and Ohio. The one that struck Kokomo, one of the most violent, had wind that reached a velocity up to 260MPH, while cutting a swath of destruction 900 feet wide. The tornado followed a 48 mile path through Russiaville, Alto and the southern part of Kokomo before heading toward Greentown and Marion. It was responsible for 25 of the 271 lives lost that night.

GO TO: Part 6, The Epilog

The Moose Lodge - Part 4, The Palm Sunday Tornado

Easter weekend of 1965 was one of those mile-stones in my life, one I’ll vividly remember. I was home from college on holiday, and dad hired me to help the janitor, Don Fewell, clean the building that Sunday. It was April 11, Palm Sunday. I left the house after dinner and drove Mom’s 1962 Chrysler Winsor, as it sat behind and blocked my 1950 Dodge truck. I got to the Moose about 6PM, parked in back, near the kitchen door. Don’s car was the only other on the lot.

We worked for several hours, Don in the bar area, while I swept and mopped the other end near the stage and dance floor. The folding doors that partitioned off the dining and poker area were open, so the building was one big long room from stage through to the poker area. It was partitioned off for Lodge meetings, Bingo, and special events, but usually, like that night, left open.

Don had tuned the radio to local WIOU. We worked to the sound of music, but kept getting an increasing number of weather updates - repeated warning of tornados moving in from the southwest. Don and I went to the front door to check toward the indicated direction. The wind was picking up; we could see fast moving clouds in a turbulent sky, but nothing to get alarmed about. We went back to work. I remember returning to check the weather several more times. The sun had set by 9pm, and the sky on the western horizon was bitch black. We could see the wind was getting even more active.

The radio reported a tornado sighting in Alto, a small farming community just two miles from us. Shortly thereafter we began hearing the wind from inside the building. Vent shudders in the ceiling began to flap open and shut in noisy rhythmic beats. The sound of the wind rose to an alarming pitch. Don and I, without agreement, walked toward each other, meeting in the dining area near the front. We stood between the two walls that jutted a short distance into the room. (“J” and “D” in the drawing). Both of us were transfixed as the noise became even louder. We stood looking into the room toward the bar area. There were large windows all around the building, big double pane ones nearly eight feet high. Glass doors stood right behind us. Through those doors could be seen the glass doors of the lobby, and then the glass front doors opening to the portico. We were looking through the windows along the wall behind the bar. We could see a big steel incendiary the lodge use for burning trash. It probably weighed a half ton. It suddenly lifted off the pad like a rocket heading for the moon, and then one of the big windows behind the bar exploded. Don and I both had the same thought, “Damn, that’s going to be a mess to clean up”. We were soon absolved of that chore as every window in the place began to crash as the storm moved inside.

Things suddenly got serious. The lights failed; the decibel level rose to that generated by freight trains; light fixtures swung violently; and the air seemed to have been sucked out of the room. I grouched and then laid prone against the wall with my hands covering my head. I looked into the room to see ghostly silhouettes flying by. Don, to my right, was grouched in a semi-squat at the end of the other wall, holding on, but dangerously exposed - not doing well. The violence lasted only a few minutes - minutes of fear, exaltation, and wonder. I couldn’t help from looking into that wind tunnel of cascading debris. I didn’t even notice I’d been hurt.

GO TO: Part 5, The Tornado Aftermath

The Moose Lodge - Part 3, The Old Lodge Burns; A New One Rises from the Ashes

The original moose building burned in the spring of 1960. I believe it was caused by an electrical short in the kitchen. The multi-alarm fire sent flames dramatically skyward, as fire trucks arched streams of water into the air, and hoses crisscrossed the streets. The glow, visible all over town, attracted people like moths to a flame, and a good portion of the citizenry showed up to view the pyrrhic spectacle.


The building was declared a total loss. We walked through it a few days later. Most of the main floor, the office and the ball room did not seem to have received much flame, but the hardwood floors, having had thousands of gallons of water poured on them, were warped and buckled, standing like sea waves frozen in a storm. The upstairs got the heat. That is where Don and I found our portable stereo record player that Dad had borrowed. It was barely recognizable, and the records resembled the warped floors.


Don and I received a hundred dollars for our melted records and charred player. We preceded to order a stereo amplifier kit and speakers. I assembled the amplifier over the summer while Don built the speaker boxes. By fall we had a state-of-the-art stereo system to take on campus at Indiana University in Bloomington.


The insurance money enabled the Lodge to plan a modern, state-of-the-art building. It was finished in 1961 - a beautifully designed edifice that surely became the talk and envy of the town’s other lodges. The floor plan below is not to scale but provides an accurate depiction of the layout.
The new building sat on six acres. There was nearly an acre of lawn in front imbuing the place with the façade of wealth and high society. A driveway passed under the front portico. The obvious intent of the architect was that cars would empty their passengers in front, simulating high class clientele attending gala events. Unfortunately the parking lot, big enough for a couple hundred cars, was placed in the back. Drivers seldom disgorged there people in front. Nearly all chose to go directly to the rear, and none elected to walk back around to the main entrance, opting instead to enter through the service door. The lodge possessed a facility the Country Club set salivated over and the members chose to come in through the kitchen. So much for refined life and sophistication. The members were working class, proud of it, and thought nothing of using the back door.
Mom said that for a while she signed up new members nearly everyday, and their rolls skyrocketed. By the mid-sixties the Moose counted three thousand members. That period marked its hay-day. The place was jammed every weekend as members danced to the music of local bands. Big name bands such as those of Guy Lombardo, Artie Shaw, and Bob Crosby were scheduled and sold out. The restaurant dished out a daily lunch special to a large clientele, and offered a variety of steaks at dinner. The club room was active six nights a week, and the poker tables filled to capacity on Thursdays with six-card stud players.


My twenty-first birthday present was a membership to the Moose. The induction was probably at the temporary location on north Washington Street in early 1961. About a dozen of us were inducted that night. We sat in three rows of folding chairs awaiting the ceremony. I was in the second or third row. The guy next to me asked why I was joining, and I told him it was because Dad was the head of the lodge and it was his wish - that I didn’t really care much one way or the other. When dad handed me the membership slip he apologized rather than offering me congratulation. I never thought he could have heard what I said, which he must have, or I would have answered the man differently.


I became a part-time employee that following summer. The new lodge was in need of additional bartenders on weekends so I earned $2 an hour mixing a number of fancy drinks popular at the time. Weekend work was fast and furious with three and four waitresses calling out orders at the same a time. There was constant action, and lots of fun for a 21 year old. That fall I got jobs bartending in Bloomington when I went back to campus. I worked five or six years at the trade.
GO TO: Part 4, The Palm Sunday Tornado

The Moose Lodge - Part 2, The Original Building

The original Kokomo lodge building was constructed around 1910 on the northeast corner of Buckeye and Taylor Streets. The gaudy Victorian architecture was familiar to the era. The brick building boasted four thick columns in front with a steep stairway ascending to a large covered porch.

The only inhabitant of the spacious porch was a modest sized, stuffed moose mounted on a wheeled platform; its sad demise being indicated by the round bullet hole conspicuous in its side. It stood alone on that platform through many seasons. The porch would have provided a great vantage for watching parades, but none came that direction, so I don’t remember ever seeing anybody keeping company with that silent sentinel of the Loyal Order of Moose.

The front door opened to a spacious lobby with a couple of large antlered Moose heads sticking out of the opposing wall. The office, to the left, was in the front corner. A counter ran the length of that end. Double doors to the right of the counter opened onto the Ball Room . That was the main entertainment center, where the lodge had its weekend dances.

Stair cases at the other end of the lobby led up and down. The more conspicuous one led to an upper level whose floor plan matched the one below. The stairs opened to a front lounge with windows looking down on the porch. The large room behind, usually reserved for solemn lodge meetings, was often commandeered for weekend activities.

The other staircase on the main lobby, less conspicuous, led to the basement. It housed the Club Room, which was a stag area, a place for men only. Members had a key to the door, or were “buzzed entry” by a button in the office.

I was down there only once that I remember. Dad took brother Don and I to the lodge one Sunday when I was about eight or nine, and we were allowed to see that inner-sanctum of male bonding. It was a large windowless room, dark, emitting an odor of tobacco smoke and stale beer. There was an old mahogany bar against one wall, lined with stools.

A couple of pool tables stood nearby, card tables sat off to one side, and slot machines lined another wall - a “speak-easy” out of the past. Dad gave us a few coins with which to play the machines and the one-arm bandits promptly stole them.
GO TO: Part 3, The Old Lodge Burns

The Moose Lodge - Part 1, Dad Becomes the Moose Manager

My dad, William R.(Buck) Buckingham, became the secretary and manager of the Kokomo Moose Lodge in 1946. I don’t know why he choose that particular career as he left one that seemed to have greater promise.

He knew electronics and had worked as a civilian instructor for the Army Air Corp during the war teaching airmen to operate and repair their radios. Mom claimed that federal officials approached him after the war to offer a position in the new space program, but he declined. For what ever the reason he quit his job in the lab at Delco radio and took a position that he held for the next twenty-five years.

The Moose Lodge, along with the other fraternal clubs - the Eagles, Elks, Masons, etc. - were prominent fixtures on the American landscape at mid-century. The lodges, combinations of social club, bar, restaurant, and nightclub, were active in local and national politics. They were also deeply involved in the community, sponsoring social events and participating in charitable activities.

In a sense the lodges operated in place of insurance companies. No one in my family had health or life insurance. We were not unusual in that respect, most middle class folk did without it - things were different then, doctors made house calls, you paid them at the door as they were leaving.
The Moose supported Mooseheart, an orphanage the kids and wife could go to should death make an unexpected appearance. Moosehaven was a retirement home in Florida available to older members. The other lodges offered their own form of “insurance”.

A good portion of the town’s people were affiliated with one or the other of the lodges, and the blacks had one too, The Keystone Club. Dad was also a member of the Elks and the Eagles. I always considered the Elks to be the upper crust of the lodges, but that opinion may not have merit.

There was an intercity-lodge council in which all the clubs came together to jointly plan many events. In those days the lodges, along with labor unions, acted as social glue, and they represented one leg of power for working and middle class America.

I was six years old when Dad went with the Moose, an age at which my understanding of the world was at the beginning of coherency. Before that there was only disjointed images of the war. Moose lodge activities formed one of those milestones of my life. There was the war and then there was the Moose.

I grew up around lodge activities, events such as: Saturday night dances and being endlessly bored in the baby-sitting area (I happily aged out of those in a few years); the Children’s Christmas program (at which each kid received a brown paper bag of candy, nuts and an orange - its contents identical to the ones provided in all the previous years), delivering food boxes to needy families with Dad (and sometimes recognizing the house, and knowing the kids inside); Fourth of July fireworks (and getting to serve “behind the lines“); Moosehaven in Florida (Dad drove an aged Moose member to the rest home in January 1953. Brother Don & I got to go as it was Christmas vacation); Mooseheart, “The City of Children” (We went on a chartered bus one time).
GO TO: Part 2, The Original Building