It’s been a while since I posted on genealogy finds. Recent, the library where I work acquired the Detroit Free Press Online Archive from 1831-1922. I found a lot, good and sad about my family, in this archive. I found secrets.
The below is from the Detroit Free Press, Aug 1, 1900.
Francis B. Egan, my second great-grandfather and former Deputy Secretary of State, formed a secret club of which he was elected president. They called it the Washington Club. He said members were tired of the “namby-pamby methods of the Michigan club.” As a politician, the club was of interest to the papers. He said club members intended to expand their organization in “every ward and precinct” of Detroit.
The paper reported: “There is to be another meeting of the club next Friday night for the adoption of a constitution and by-laws. Mr. Egan, however, refused to say where the meeting will be held as he stated it was to be a secret gathering.”
It reminds me of the political version of the secret feminist groups I started in college, only these are Republican politics when Republican meant pro-labor. I can’t help but smile.
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