Lodge History
On January 1, 1990, The Seneca Lodge of Sullivan Trail Council in Elmira merged with the Wakanda Lodge of Steuben Area Council in Bath NY. As was the practice at that time, new lodges, created by council mergers, took the lower lodge number. This happened to be #186, which represented the Wakanda Lodge. (Later in 1992, when the General Sullivan Council was annexed, Taken Dod #186 took the lower Winnigus Lodge #30). The winter fellowship at Camp Gorton in February, 1990, saw arrowmen from both Wakanda and Seneca Lodges come together to design a new flap and to pick a lodge name. I was advisor of Wakanda at the time of the merger and Mike McCarthy of Elmira was the lodge advisor of Seneca Lodge. That first year, we both served as co-advisors and we had co-chief (Brian Eno from Seneca Lodge and Mark Kosty from Wakanda). The merger was a very harmonous merger, due in large part since most of the lodge officers had partacipated in a two council contigent troop at the 1989 jamboree. The merger was so positive that our chiefs were asked to lead a session at the 1990 NOAC, held at Indiana University, on how to promote the true spirit of brotherhood, when lodges are forced to merge due to council mergers.
Getting back to the orginis of Tkaen Dod. The council name of Five Rivers had already been selected, from a council wide contest, held during 1989. At the winter fellowship, the arrowmen wanted to have a lodge name that complimented the council name (and incidently in 1990 there were only three lodges nationwide that this held true). Since the "fiver rivers" merged in "Painted Post" and since "Painted Post's orgin was Senecan (Chief Montour stands in the center of the village), the arrowmen wanted to find out the Seneca name for "Painted Post." Chiefs Eno and Kosty traveled to the Seneca reservation near Syracuse to talk to Mrs. Myrtle Peterson. Mr. Peterson was the instructor, on the reservation, of the Senecan language. When the chiefs met with Mrs Peterson she told them that "the Senecas never had a PAINTED Post". The post that existed in the Painted Post area was not "painted". This plain post had been used as a type of bulletin board and when the white settlers moved into the area it was they who painted it. To paint this post was a desicration to the Seneca people. Mrs Peterson suggested to our lodge chiefs that they name the lodge Tkaen Dod meaning "there is a post there." By doing so this would honor the Seneca people, compliment the councils Five Rivers name and be a name in which the idea and research had originated with the youth of the lodge. Tkaen Dod was thus born and has been our lodge name since the spring of 1990.
Yours in brotherhood,
Ken Masteller
OA History
The Order of the Arrow (OA) was founded by Dr. E. Urner Goodman and Carroll A. Edson in 1915 at the Treasure Island Camp of the Philadelphia Council, Boy Scouts of America. It became an official program experiment in 1922 and was approved as part of the Scouting program in 1934.
In 1948 the OA, recognized as the BSA's national brotherhood of honor campers, became an official part of the national camping program of the Boy Scouts of America.