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08/14/11, 01:29 AM
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Can't find bacon seeds
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Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: On the move again
Posts: 1,493
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Are you a Grange member? What is it like?
Ok as a spin off from my other thread I thought I would ask what it's like in present day to be a Grange member as I do not know anyone currently in it and most of my memory of it is coming straight from Little House on the Prairie.  
So what exactly do you do there now? What's the inside info? 
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You are confined only by the walls you build yourself.
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08/14/11, 01:32 AM
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Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: New York
Posts: 3,891
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Yeah, me too.
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I cried because I had no shoes, until I saw a man who had no feet.
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08/14/11, 01:42 AM
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Canning Crazy
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Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Farm Country NY
Posts: 2,332
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Good question. I dont have the answer but I am looking foward to hearing it also.
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Be the kind of woman that, when your feet
hit the floor each morning, the devil says
"Oh Crap, She's up!"
Tammy 
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08/14/11, 06:07 AM
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aka RamblinRoseRanc :)
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Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Morristown, TN
Posts: 5,066
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Ditto. My only knowledge comes from Chris LeDoux songs. Sounded like fun, though. 
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" It's better to ride even if you get thrown, than to wind up just wishin' ya had."
Chris Ledoux 
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08/14/11, 06:53 AM
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Join Date: Feb 2009
Location: WV
Posts: 3,268
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Grange Membership
The Grange (officially known as The Order of Patrons of Husbandry) is a fraternal organization with a rich history and a highly visible community presence in the United States. (For historical information, see Birthplace of an American Treasure)
The organization is a perfect example of a grass-roots, bottom-up group. The backbone of the Grange is the more than 3,000 local "subordinate" Granges which are located in more than 30 states. These Granges offer a wide range of locally-oriented programs and activities for children, youth and adults. Each holds regular meetings where issues of community concern are often discussed. There are social events, contests and community service projects sponsored by the Granges.
On the county or regional level these local Granges band together into units known as Pomona Granges, primarily for discussion of concerns which affect a larger territory. On the statewide level Granges cooperate by supporting a State Grange organization which oversees the activities of all subordinate Granges as well as conducts lobbying and other activities on behalf of all members in the state.
The National Grange is situated in its own office building just a couple of blocks from the White House. National programs are headquartered there and lobbying staff is active on Capitol Hill.
The Grange at each level is guided by 16 elected officers. The officer slate at each level is led by a master. This title, which refers to the position functioning as the organization's president or chairperson, is one of several officer names dating back to the feudal English estates. The vice president is called the overseer and there are people assuming the duties of secretary, treasurer, chaplain and an executive committee. A lecturer is responsible for the short programs at each meeting and, often, the Grange's community service program.
The Grange, like the Masons, Odd Fellows, Elks and Moose, is a fraternal organization. One distinctive feature of fraternal orders is their emphasis upon traditional procedures for conducting their meetings. These procedures, often called rituals, employ members who have specific parts to play in opening and closing ceremonies. The Grange, like other fraternities, has levels or "degrees" of membership and a member advances from one level to the next by participating in or observing the rituals for that level.
Joining a local Grange is a positive step which can bring many personal rewards. Prospective members are recommended by existing members but, in actuality, anyone interested in joining merely needs to approach a member and ask for an application.
The Grange has the historical distinction as being one of the first major national organizations besides the church which sought the membership and involvement of everyone in the family. Grange members have an equal voice and an equal vote at meetings regardless of their age, sex or position within the Grange. Children ages five through 16 are eligible to belong to a junior Grange, whether or not they come from a Grange family.
The Grange provides numerous benefits for its members. Among those are insurance programs provided exclusively for Grangers by Grange companies. Grange Advantage, a program of the National Grange, offers credit card, college selection services and other money- saving programs.
But perhaps more than anything else, the Grange's interest in legislative action sets it apart from all other fraternities, service and family organizations. Since its earliest years, the Grange has included legislative involvement -- from a strictly non-partisan position -- as one of its distinctive characteristics. All policies which the Grange fights for on the local, state and national levels is decided upon by the grass-roots membership. Much Grange policy reflects the predominantly rural and small-town composition of its membership and therefore deals with topics of concern to those people: rural quality of life issues, farm programs, rural economic development, environmental and consumer issues, taxation, transportation and similar topics.
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08/14/11, 01:52 PM
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Join Date: Aug 2005
Posts: 16,319
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Bet it aint what ya all thought it might be, huh?
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08/14/11, 02:08 PM
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Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: Oklahoma
Posts: 3,116
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So do they have any groups in OK? If so where?
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08/14/11, 06:40 PM
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Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: Ohio
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Gee, I haven't been to a Grange meeting in over 30 years. I know there was a ritual opening ceremony and closing ceremony. There were dues and meetings, potluck dinners and fair displays. I was too young to remember much of the business part of the meetings but I know finances were discussed and there was a treasurer's report and stuff like an FFA or 4-H meeting. Grandma and Grandpa were members for years but there were no new members to continue the chapter and it was dissolved back in 199something.
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08/14/11, 08:23 PM
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Join Date: Dec 2010
Location: Central Oregon
Posts: 6,175
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Locally, the Grange is the Cattlemen and ranchers. There is a lot of social stuff, but they spend a lot of energy fighting against the anti-agriculture legislation that the humaniacs (who want everyone to be a vegan) and the ecological terrorist type groups are trying to get the legislature to pass.
Most of the legislators and a lot of the general population have no idea what is involved in getting their food to the table and don't know what effect their laws might have.
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08/14/11, 10:46 PM
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Can't find bacon seeds
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Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: On the move again
Posts: 1,493
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Well I am not in a state with one so I guess that its moot for me.
Hmm Little House on the Prairie made it sound like Pa was always going to go vote or fight over grain prices.
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You are confined only by the walls you build yourself.
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08/15/11, 12:40 AM
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Join Date: Apr 2010
Location: Colorado
Posts: 390
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Surprising to me that an organization that is centered around rural and agricultural communities wouldn't have a presence in Arkansas and Missouri or any of the other southern states in that area. Wonder why
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08/15/11, 01:01 AM
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Join Date: Aug 2009
Location: Washington
Posts: 2,217
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Back when I attended Grange with my Grandparents it was structured much like what was described.
Here is the fun stuff they did:
Pot lucks, some really good down home cooking, dancing, piano and violin playing. I was privileged to watch a very gifted Violin player make his instrument sing at the age of 100 yrs old. The piano player wove those keys like a fine tapestry of sound! The laughter, smiles, hugs and conversation were all about embracing family and a farmer's lifestyle. They promoted integrity, men showed manners, women were gracious and they had their flower clubs and seed trading clubs. They held meeting and they held celebrations, they were an extension of a life lived more simply with a dedication to excellence!
They gave to charity, they helped others, they had special events and did so much more in making their organization into a living breathing community of spirit....
What are granges like today? Well I hope they are something like that!
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Thank you kindly,
Romy "Island Girl"
[URL="http://www.romysrealm.blogspot.com"]
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08/15/11, 09:21 AM
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Join Date: Aug 2005
Posts: 16,319
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am12 Hit history of American Grange, then hit Grange-National History, then you have to hit another heading, but at the top of that one they have locations of THE OFFICERS of the local Grange. They seem to center around Coffieville, but the officers are in adair, and other towns.
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08/15/11, 11:22 AM
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Join Date: Jul 2011
Location: NE Arkansas
Posts: 6,835
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MOgal
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Arkansas isn't either. 
 = Voting in the USA
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08/15/11, 01:03 PM
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Join Date: Aug 2005
Posts: 16,319
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The Grange is best known , when, as a riseing power, in the 1870s and 80s it fought the railroads who, after being givin every other section of land along their right of way, by the government in order for them to get the collottrial in order to get the money to lay the track, they sold it for a fortune to farmers, and, after dumping farmers and foriengers off all along the track, and they proveing up their farms to be a prosperious position in most cases, the railroads tried to charge high rates for the grain and livestock they hauled long distances to markets like Chicago, and St Joe Mo. After they had won that fight, they came to the eptome of their power. They could sway elections up to and includeing the president, and this caused presidentual wanna bees way up into the 60s to include the farm bloc as important to there success, long after the Grainge had ceased to be a national power as it once was.
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08/15/11, 01:41 PM
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Fair to adequate Mod
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Join Date: May 2002
Location: Between Crosslake and Emily Minnesota
Posts: 13,728
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I think the last time I heard of the "Grange" was when watching "The Real McCoys" as a kid.
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This is the government the Founding Fathers warned us about.....
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08/15/11, 05:00 PM
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zone 5 - riverfrontage
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Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Forests of maine
Posts: 5,872
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Our town used to have a grange hall.
A group of us got together last winter to see about re-opening the old grange. But so far we have not been able to gather enough people. We all like the like of shared farm equipment and grants, but some are terribly afraid of the masonic-like rituals.
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08/15/11, 07:34 PM
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Join Date: Aug 2005
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I wonder what got farmers interested in masonic like rituals in the first place. In the 1870s/80s/90s, seems like farmers were more religious than city people, like today, and as such, they wouldnt have gone in for rituals such as the masonic lodge, woodmen of the world, odd fellows, orders of the eastern star went in for. I wonder if ALL Granges had those rituals, or if, and I bet there were, Granges that were formed without rituals as such so as to attract menmbers.
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08/15/11, 07:41 PM
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Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: Missouri
Posts: 2,349
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ET1 SS
Our town used to have a grange hall.
A group of us got together last winter to see about re-opening the old grange. But so far we have not been able to gather enough people. We all like the like of shared farm equipment and grants, but some are terribly afraid of the masonic-like rituals.
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And what is so terrible about "Masonic like rituals?"
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