WESTSIDE COVER STORY : Lodging Some Concerns : Shrinking in Size, the Moose, Elks and Similar Clubs Seek to Attract Younger Members

As Noble Grand of the Seaside Lodge of the International Order of Odd Fellows, Mark Gonzales is a young man in an old men’s treehouse.

“It’s kind of fun, but it’s a dying-out thing. I don’t know if I’m going to be the savior of it,” said Gonzales, who was just named to a second term as head of the Odd Fellows’ Santa Monica branch.

Recruited by his father-in-law, the 37-year-old insurance claims supervisor has brought in a few members of his own age. But these new fellows at the Odd Fellows are bucking a trend.

Age, death, television and other distractions have shrunk the clubs that once played a major role in American life.

And yet they hang on, providing men with companionship, charitable opportunities and, for those so inclined, cheap drinks and a place to smoke; in short, a refuge from the 1990s.

Some lodges have made concessions to the times, dropping much of their elaborate ritual and throwing open their doors to wives and children for all events except the initiation of new members.

The leaders of the Loyal Order of Moose--once known as “dictators”--have hung up their fancy capes and turban-like “tah”s (that’s hat spelled backward) in favor of milder titles and brightly colored sport coats.

Others have not, but they’re thinking about it, including the Masons, the oldest of America’s fraternal organizations.

Once, said William F. Stovall, Grand Master of the Masons of California, “the movers and shakers of most of the cities were active lodge men. . . . That’s where they practiced their charity, that’s where they really did their networking.”

With the Masons’ statewide membership shrunk to just over 125,000, little more than half of what it was 20 years ago, “that’s not really the case these days,” he said.

At a weekend retreat earlier this month, Masonic leaders decided to seek greater exposure of their charity work and community service as part of an effort to renew interest in their group.

“We’ve got to do more of that stuff,” said Auri Spigelman, chairman of the weekend conference. “Not just meetings and tired old men getting more and more lethargic.”

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At 53, Spigelman, a vascular surgeon at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, identifies himself as “one of the younger Masons.” He joined five years ago, lured by a fascination with the philosophical underpinnings of Masonic teachings.

“The basic goal of Masonry is to teach moral lessons and ethical behavior,” said Spigelman, who just finished a term as Worshipful Master of Santa Monica’s Composite Lodge No. 595.

“Without these basic things, Masonry would be nothing more than a social club, and we want it to be more than a social club,” he said. “If I wanted that, I could join the Moose.”

Unlike other lodges, the Masons have barred themselves from actively recruiting new members, mainly to ensure that applicants join of their own free will. But even the more aggressive organizations are finding it hard to keep their numbers up.

Wally Pollacci, Exalted Ruler of Culver City Elks Lodge No. 1917, said he has brought in about 130 new brethren in the last two years. But the herd now numbers no more than 750, down from 1,000 four years ago, and it is one of the Westside’s busiest lodges.

The Culver City Elks hang their stuffed elk head in their own roomy building on Washington Place, where the city has renamed one block Avenue of the Flags in recognition of their patriotic efforts. The club sponsors a yearly Iwo Jima Hill Climb and Bataan Walk Race.

Not everything it does is all that healthful, however.

In January alone, top sirloin steaks were listed for three of four weekly dinners; prime rib au jus rounded out the month. Every Wednesday, beef dip and barbecue sandwiches are also available.

“The ‘50s Are Back,” says a sign for a steak and lobster dinner featuring “lots of prizes” and dancing to music by The Esquires.

Maybe the ‘50s never left.

On a rainy evening in January, tux-clad lodge leaders delivered a set of memorized pep talks from pulpits decorated with elk horns to a small group of initiates.

“I was kind of making fun and making humorous remarks beforehand, because I didn’t know what I was getting into,” said David Oliver, 40, a clothing retailer who went through the ritual.

Actually, he compared the goings-on to the foolishness of Fred Flintstone and his lodge, the Loyal Order of Water Buffalos.

“I could still see myself doing that,” he said after the ceremony, “but it’s serious stuff and the values are certainly something I believe in: honesty, loyalty. . . . It’s just about real, old-fashioned American values.”

Pollacci agreed. “It’s very important to let people know the Elks are not a bunch of drunks,” he said.

Despite his efforts, Pollacci is fighting an implacable rival in Death, the most successful fraternity, which recruits about 3% of men in their late 60s every year, according to the National Center for Health Statistics.

Not surprisingly, many lodges comprising men in that age group are shrinking at about the same rate, organizers said.

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Why the decline?

It’s not that people don’t care about fellowship and good works, sociologists say. But things have changed in America since the first bloom of fraternal organizations in the 19th Century and the membership booms that followed the two world wars.

“The men who built these organizations were products of World War I and World War II, both episodes in our history when there was a lot of bonding among men,” said USC sociologist Vern L. Bengston. “Baby boomers haven’t had that sort of generational, fraternal experience.”

And the ones who have don’t seem eager to reconstruct the camaraderie of wartime. Vietnam veterans, for example, have comparatively low membership in the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the American Legion, according to those organizations.

More people commute long distances to work, helping to diminish community ties and shrink free time; the demographic mix of many communities has changed; and a century-long shift toward individualism has left many less inclined toward group activities, sociologists say.

People can also turn elsewhere for death and disability insurance, one of the economic benefits that fueled the first big boom of fraternal organizations during the late 1800s and early 1900s.

It was a big business in its day. In 1930, James J. Davis, as Supreme Dictator of the Loyal Order of the Moose, used his popularity to win a U.S. Senate seat from Pennsylvania. He later sold his Moose contract, which had awarded him a share of all initiation fees, for $600,000.

Sociologist Mary Anne Clawson, author of “Constructing Brotherhood,” said the single-sex organizations that flourished in the 19th Century lost their appeal as family life took center stage after World War II.

“Lodges always met in the evening, and that required men to take a night out every week with the guys,” she said. Also, she said, the lodges provided drama and entertainment for a simpler time, “and they could not compete with the very elaborate, sophisticated types of entertainment options we have today.”

At one time, service clubs such as Rotary and Kiwanis also excluded members of the opposite sex, but the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1987 that they are public service organizations and must be open to all.

Since then, the number of women has risen dramatically in such groups, and many service clubs say they are doing as well as ever.

The fraternal lodges, by contrast, which have women’s auxiliaries but no female members, are having a harder time of it, especially in long-settled areas like the Westside, where there are lots of other things to do.

Still, it’s hard to beat a deal like that offered at the Santa Monica Moose lodge on New Year’s Eve: six-ounce steak, four-ounce lobster tail, funny hat, noisemaker, confetti, four-piece band and limo service, all for $12.50. There were 176 takers.

“Can you imagine this anywhere else?” asked administrator John Ford, 59, a member since 1967.

New members of the lodge, which charges $35 a year in dues, can also be comforted by the thought that if they die, their children under 18 can be taught and cared for at Mooseheart, a boarding school in Illinois, Ford said.

Or they can retire in comfort at Moosehaven, a retirement home near Jacksonville, Fla., where beer for the residents costs a nickel a glass during happy hour.

It is hard to gauge just how attractive this might be for the younger generation, but for many of late-middle years and beyond, the familiarity and safety of a private, locked-door club are obvious.

“It’s pretty convenient and it’s much nicer” than meeting friends in a bar, said Liam McCarthy, a member of the Santa Monica branches of both the Moose and the Elk.

“You have a select group of people,” said McCarthy, who says he’s “over 65” and a semiretired manager of engineering for Sony Pictures. “They come to your home and check your background. That makes it comfortable.”

Like many local lodges, the Santa Monica Moose sponsors Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts programs and Little League teams. It recently presented a set of new flags for the flagpoles at Santa Monica High School.

There are Friday night dinners, Sunday breakfasts and special events, including a Hawaiian Country night and a spaghetti-and-meatballs karaoke bash. There are also Easter, Christmas and Halloween parties for members and their children.

A moose head as big as a VW Beetle watches over the festivities. It is a prize shot in Alaska by lodge founder Robert Kelly decades ago, according to club lore.

“We need to get away from the idea that this is for a clique that sits around and plays cards,” said Ford, who runs the $250,000 to $300,000 operation.

“Our goal is to get younger people as members. They’ll need something for kids to do or (the parents) won’t be interested.”

Times staff writer Pancho Doll and correspondent James Benning contributed to this report.

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Species-by-Species

EAGLES: Founded by half a dozen theater owners who met in a Seattle shipyard in 1898, the Fraternal Order of Eagles has a history of social activism that includes efforts to establish worker’s compensation, old-age pensions, Social Security and the declaration of Mother’s Day. Presidential Eagles have included Warren G. Harding, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman. Other well-known members have included Jimmy Durante and J. Edgar Hoover. Nationwide membership is just over 1 million; charities include cancer research and Alzheimer’s disease. There are two chapters, called aeries, on the Westside.

ELKS: The Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks claims 1.3 million members nationwide, down from a high of 1.6 million 15 years ago. The fraternal order was formed in 1868 by an entertainer seeking social activity. The name Elks was chosen because the animal is “indigenous to North America and is quick and gentle and ferocious in defending its young,” said spokesman Mike Manning. Lodges are open to non-communist U.S. men of good moral character, age 21 and older. Last year, the Elks donated about $160 million to various causes, including aid to war veterans. An Elks information packet lists “Americanism” as the leading community affair sponsored by the Elks. The Elks employ health workers to visit public schools, where they administer eye tests and screen children for orthopedic diseases. Nationally, contributions were off 4.7% last year.

MASONS: Masons are the nation’s oldest and largest fraternity, with a membership that has ranged from George Washington, Benjamin Franklin and Andrew Jackson to Irving Berlin, Norman Vincent Peale and Roy Rogers. The group’s secret rituals are what most people know it for, but that aspect is much less prevalent now. A predominantly African American group called Prince Hall Masonry clings to its independence, but moves are afoot for the two organizations to recognize each other. America’s 2.3 million Masons, down from 4.1 million in 1959, give more than $500 million to charity every year. Although Masonry eschews formal theology, its members are required to be believers in God and an afterlife. The Roman Catholic Church bars Communion to Masons as practitioners of an incompatible “natural religion.”

MOOSE: The Loyal Order of Moose was founded in 1888 in Kentucky by five men who wanted a fraternal organization combining ritual and social activity. The name Moose was chosen because of the animal’s size, strength and devotion to protecting its family. Ritual has been downgraded in recent years as the group changed its focus to family activities. The organization spends about $50 million a year to support a residential school for needy children, a retirement center and a drug-and-alcohol-awareness program for teen-agers, among other charitable activities. The Moose claim nearly 1.9 million members in the United States, Canada and Great Britain, up from 1.75 million in 1982.

ODD FELLOWS: Like the Masons, who took the name and rituals of medieval bricklayers, the International Order of Odd Fellows traces its name to the caste of men in England who performed odd jobs. Once a rival of the Masons in numbers, if not influence, the group’s membership has declined from 1.5 million at the turn of the century to half a million today, spread across 20 countries. “We have trouble recruiting, like everybody else, because young people don’t think it’s too exciting,” says Santa Monica lodge treasurer Jerry Wilbur, 67. “They don’t want to get involved in fund raising. . . . And if you put a sign around your neck saying Odd Fellows, we’re really in trouble.”

SHRINERS: An offshoot of Masonry, they are best recognized for precision mini-bike drill teams and fanciful regalia. Their activities help support 19 orthopedic hospitals for children and three burn institutes. Their $4-billion trust fund makes them better-funded than many universities. Despite aging membership, the money keeps coming in, much of it as bequests in the wills of deceased members, according to an official at Shriners headquarters in Florida. There are about 720,000 Shriners, down from 960,000 in the late 1970s.