We need to go back to the beginning of Elkdom. The Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks was formed by a group of Thespians as a social club back in 1868 because of the blue laws that were strictly enforced and Sundays in New York City was a very dry day. So, these 15 men, known as the Jolly Corks, got together and formed The Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. We thought that this might be the right time to list the names of the fine 15 Gentlemen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
E.W. Platt – Frank Langhorne – William Carletfon – William Sheppard –\n Richard R. Steirly – Charles A. Vivian – John T. Kent – Henry Vandemark\n – Harry Bosworth – M.G. Ash – G.F. McDonald – W.L. Bowron – Thomas G. \nRiggs – J.G. Wilton – John H. Blume<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Eventually, these 15 fine gentlemen started New York Lodge Nr. 1 which is still in existence today. \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Of course, The Order only had 1 Lodge. As the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks grew and spread West, a few more Lodges were formed here in California. San Francisco Lodge Nr. 3 was instituted April 11, 1876 and Sacramento Lodge Nr. 6 was instituted December 6, 1885. \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0As more and more Lodges were formed, the California Elks Association was instituted and it created various Districts within the State. In 1910, the Central District was created and was made up of 8 Lodges:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As the Membership in our Organization grew in the various Lodges throughout California. In 1938, The California Elks Association created The West Central District and added a few more Lodges to the District:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 1967, The California Elks Association split the West Central District and created the West Central Coast District. With this split, the following Lodges were assigned to the West Central Coast District:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In addition, during that same year, Redwood City Lodge Nr. 1991 was assigned to the Bay District.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On March 24, 1972, Cupertino Lodge Nr. 2445 surrendered their Charter to Grand Lodge. On April 1, 1985, Milpitas Lodge Nr. 2400 surrendered their Charter to Grand Lodge. On October 17, 2012, Los Gatos Lodge Nr. 1857 surrendered their Charter to Grand Lodge. \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With the above Lodges being transferred or surrendering their Charters, the West Central District now has the 10 Lodges listed on the Home page of this site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We hope you have enjoyed our little trip back into the History of our District. \u00c2\u00a0There will be links to the Lodges that have Web Site and links to Grand Lodge in Chicago and a link to the California-Hawaii Elks Association in Fresno. \u00c2\u00a0Our District wants to thank you for taking the time to view our site.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We need to go back to the beginning of Elkdom. The Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks was formed by a group of Thespians as a social club back in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheawcd.org\/newsite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/395"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheawcd.org\/newsite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheawcd.org\/newsite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cheawcd.org\/newsite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cheawcd.org\/newsite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cheawcd.org\/newsite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/395\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":396,"href":"https:\/\/cheawcd.org\/newsite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/395\/revisions\/396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheawcd.org\/newsite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}