O.F. Hall, Pulaski, Giles County, Tennessee

The Grand United Order of Odd Fellows (GUOOF) is the African-American counterpart of the Order of Odd Fellows, a fraternal group. The first lodge of the GUOOF was established in 1843 in New York City by a charter from the English Odd Fellows. A fraternal group complete with regalia and ranks, the GUOOF also offered social insurance benefits to its members. The first lodge in Tennessee, the Memphis Star Lodge #1501, was established in 1872. By the 1910s, the GUOOF had a national membership of more than 300,000 members that represented more than 11% of all African American men. Membership declined after the Great Depression, and there is not currently a Grand Lodge of Tennessee.

The GUOOF were active in Tennessee during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Lodges were located in all three grand divisions of the state, in towns ranging from Chattanooga, Coal Creek, Strawberry Plains, Cowan, Murfreesboro, Memphis, Erin, Jackson and numerous other towns. The picture above is of the "Colored O.F. Hall," the term used to designate the building on an 1891 Sanborn Insurance Map of Pulaski, Tennessee. The lodge was located on the top floor.

(Image courtesy Digital Sanborn Map Collection, Walker Library, Middle Tennessee State University)

I have not yet learned how long the GUOOF met at this location in Pulaski. The building is located on the town square, at 100 W. Jefferson.