English-born Thomas Wildey was the founder of the Order of Odd-Fellows in North America. He had himself been initiated in London before his emigration and founded the first chapter in the United States in Baltimore in 1819. By 1831, there were more than six hundred members in Baltimore and chapters were spreading across the continent. Wildey died at his home in Baltimore at the age of eighty and was buried in Green Mount Cemetery three days later. (By John Osborne)
Source Citation
J.Thomas Scharf, History of Baltimore County and City, from the earliest times to the present day .... (Philadelphia, PA: Louis H. Everts, 1881), 761.
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