On May 18, 1929 E. Urner Goodman Scout Executive acting as Supreme Chief of the Fire merged together the five Chicago Lodges initiated by his old Assistant Camp Director Carroll A. Edson. The Grand Lodge had maintained a rule that councils could have one lodge for each of their Scout camps. Goodman constructively ended that rule, as Chicago was the only Council remaining with more than one lodge.

Goodman’s decision to merge the lodges together was upsetting to some of the local Arrowmen. It also diminished their voting block at Grand Lodge Meetings. The five Chicago lodges were Moqua Lodge 7, Wakay Lodge 13, Blackhawk Lodge 21, Checaugau Lodge 23 and Garrison Lodge 25.

The new lodge formed retained the Moqua Lodge number chartering as Owasippe Lodge 7. Owasippe Lodge selected a totem recognizing the original lodges, the “Hand of Friendship”. The Hand of Friendship is an open hand reminiscent of the hand of Adam in Michaelangelo’s “The Creation” with an arrow placed in the palm, the five fingers representing the five original lodges coming together in one hand.

Following the merger, each of the five original lodges became a chapter bearing the name of the original lodge. Following the merger, the Douglas Division, Chicago’s designated group for segregated Scouts that had been denied a lodge in 1923 because of the rule limiting councils to one lodge per camp, was included in the Order of the Arrow. Takodah Chapter became Chicago’s sixth chapter and our Order’s earliest known African American Arrowmen.