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Knights of Columbus
CLASS OF EIGHTY WERE
INSTALLED
11-24-1916
Maurice McCabe of
Milwaukee Speaks in Defense of Loyalty of Catholics.
FIVE
HUNDRED GATHER TO WITNESS DEGREE WORK
The initiation of 80
members into the first three degrees of the Knights of Columbus, the largest
and most successful initiation of the kind ever held in Watertown was the order
of the day at St. Henry’s hall Sunday afternoon. More than 500 knights gathered from
Milwaukee, Fond du Lac, Janesville and many other cities of the state. Thirty members of the big class will become
members of the Watertown council, the balance being candidates of other
councils of the state.
The degree work as
exemplified by the three teams was of the highest order. The Watertown team, putting on the firs
degree work, was in excellent form; it is likely that the two best teams in the
west were here to put on the second and third degrees. The second degree was put on by a team from
Pere Marquette council, Milwaukee, the principals being Oliver O’Boyle and
Emmet Kerrigan; the famous Chicago team with Henry Lynch and James Donohue put
on the third degree.
John Kelley, Dodge
County Superintendent of schools acted as toastmaster at the banquet which
followed the initiatory work, and at which more than 300 local and visiting
knights sat down at one time. A roast chicken
dinner was served with the assistance of fifty young women who wore white
dresses and white caps with the K. of C. emblem.
Maurice McCabe,
Milwaukee, past state deputy, welcomed the new knights into the order. He dwelt at some length on the obligations
incurred. True charity, one of the
cardinal teachings of the order, consists not alone in endowing institutions,
he declared, but in unostentatious aid to widows and foundlings as well.
The charges that
arise from some quarters that Knights of Columbus are disloyal and un-American
were answered by the speaker, who declared that charges of disloyalty to any
government were ridiculous in view of the well-known fact that in the English
army Catholics are fighting side by side with Church of England men; that in
Germany they are mates at arms with their Lutheran countrymen, and in all
countries they are fighting with men of all religions and with no religion.
The record of the
Catholics in this country was briefly reviewed to show that they had come to the
front whenever a test had come, the Catholics had proven their patriotism
beyond a shadow of a doubt.
J.D. Hemlock of
Waukesha made a short address discussing the duties of knighthood as regards
both to the church and the country.
Alexius H. Bass, the
well-known Madison baritone, sang a vocal solo, one of the numbers of the
program, and there was music by the Weber-Stube orchestra and a reading by Mrs.
Alexius H. Bass, “A Few Bars in the Scale of G.”
The success of the
day’s program is largely due to the personal efforts of Ed. Sipp, grand
commander of the local council, under whose general supervision the various
committees worked. Watertown Daily Times 11-24-1916
History of Watertown, Wisconsin