When the first lodge building was destroyed by a tornado, calls went out for donations to help rebuild. The building that stands at 421 North Samsula Drive contains the bones of this effort (it has since been renovated several times).

Some of the responses to the call came from other lodges across the country, and at that time many members still used Slovenian as their first language, which is reflected in some of the letters included here. I have separated them into letters written in English and those in Slovenian.

My thanks to Pauline Lockwood for sharing these letters from fifty years ago that give us a window into the past.

Donation Letters in English

Donation Letters in Slovenian

Lodge 603 Records of Donations (downloads as a pdf)

Sortable Database for all Lodge donation letters (to see the actual letters, use the links above):