History

Otyokwa

(Brotherhood in the Algonquin language)

Otyokwa Lodge started in October 1945 by a ritual team from the Tom Kita Chara Lodge from Samoset Council in Wausau. From 1945 until 1948 the lodge operated out of Nawakwa, the council camp at that time, near Cornell. Then, upon the development of Camp Phillips, its ritual grounds were moved to the new camp.

Chartered: 1946

Lodge Totem

The Otyokwa Lodge totem was designed and approved in 1953 by vote at the Otyokwa Lodge 337 conclave. So it was that the totem peculiar to the Otyokwa Lodge was designed after the "gauntlet", made of rawhide lacing and glazed beads. The fifty [colored] beads representing the gauntlet knots symbolically represent "the greatest medicines", the four dark blue beads stand for the four seasons, the four light blue beads for the four basic foods, the two yellow for the sun and the moon, and two black for the wind and the rain. The thirty-eight red (in form of the arrow) for the thirty-eight major stars and constellations. The white beads serve as the background. Extending from this significant totem are three thong ends each, when knotted, represent the three levels of membership in the Order of the Arrow - Ordeal - Brotherhood - Vigil.