ELKS MC
THE
MOTHER CHAPTER

CRANFORD LODGE
#2006

 

"...The Golden Cord Is Severed
He Has Passed Unto Realms On High."

Dear Elks;

Our State Association has suffered a catastrophic loss. We have lost our #1 supporter and cheerleader. Art was always so proud of the accomplishments of the Elks of New Jersey. He never missed an opportunity to tell anyone and everyone how great his State was. He was a man truly driven by the spirit of Elkdom.

I ask each and every Elk in the same spirit of Elkdom to press forward with courage and commitment to accomplish the work of our Association and our beloved Order. We can honor Art by being the very best in everything we do.

"Elks Make A Difference" was not only his motto but his firm belief. In the last months of this Association year and for all the years to come, we must make a difference in our communities and our State.

To accomplish this, we must strengthen our Lodges, initiate new members to help us in our charitable and patriotic work and remember our Special Children, Camp Moore, the Miracle on the Mountain, all of our youth programs, our Veterans, the Army of Hope, the Peer Leadership and our Elks National Foundation.

Although no longer with us physically, his spirit lives in each and every one of us. "As he was true to us, let us be true to him."

Please keep Art and Lynda and the entire Mayer Family in your prayers. I am certain that God has found a special place for a man who cared so much about our special children.

Fraternally,

Frank Vesely
State President


Request from Lynda Mayer

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to
Elks Camp Moore
New Jersey Elks Special Children’s Committee

To make a donation:
New Jersey State Elks
Special Children's Committee
665 Rahway Ave
PO Box 1596
Woodbridge , NJ 07095

Biography of Hon. Arthur Mayer, Jr., PGER

ORIGIN OF THE TOAST

by Mike Kelly
Grand Lodge Historian

In regard to the Elks' 11 O'clock Toast and its origin, we have to go back long before the B.P.O.E. came into existence. One of the main contributions of Charles Richardson -- in stage name of Charles Algernon Sidney Vivian and founder of the American branch of the Jolly Corks -- was to deliver into the hands of newborn Elks the rituals and traditions of a fraternal organization started in England around 1010 A.D., the Royal and Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes, to which he belonged prior to coming to New York.

The R.A.O.B, or Buffaloes as we shall henceforth refer to them, also practiced an 11 o'clock toast in remembrance of the Battle of Hastings in October of 1066. Following his victory, William of Normandy imported a set of rules, both martial and civil in nature, to keep control of a seething Norman-Saxon population always on the edge of a revolution.

Among those rules was a curfew law requiring all watch fires, bonfires (basically all lights controlled by private citizens that could serve as signals) to be extinguished at 11 each night. From strategically placed watchtowers that also served as early fire-alarm posts, the call would go out to douse or shutter all lights and bank all fires. This also served to discourage secret and treasonous meetings, as chimney sparks stood out against the black sky. A person away from his home and out on the darkened streets, when all doors were barred for the night, risked great peril from either evildoers or patrolling militia.

The hour of 11 quickly acquired a somber meaning, and in the centuries that followed, became the synonym throughout Europe for someone on his deathbed or about to go into battle: i.e." His family gathered about his bed at the 11th hour," or "The troops in the trenches hastily wrote notes to their families as the 11th hour approached when they must charge over the top.”

Thus, when the 15 Jolly Corks (of whom seven were not native-born Americans) voted on February 16, 1868, to start a more formal and official organization, they were already aware of an almost universally prevalent sentiment about the mystic and haunting aura connected with the nightly hour of 11, and it took no great eloquence by Vivian to establish a ritual toast similar to that of the Buffaloes at the next-to-last hour each day.

The great variety of 11 O'clock Toasts, including the Jolly Corks Toast, makes it clear that there was no fixed and official version until 1906-10. Given our theatrical origins, it was almost mandatory that the pre-1900 Elks would be expected to compose a beautiful toast extemporaneously at will. Regardless of the form, however, the custom is as old as the Elks.