In the fall, 10-year-old Ryder Molepske-Eoff received a double-lung transplant after being on a waiting list for 169 days.
Part of his recovery was funded by the Odd Fellows of Texas Plano Lodge #114, who held a cornhole tournament in his honor and raised over $8,000, says Charles Stephenson, Grand Master of Odd Fellows of Texas.
The Odd Fellows have a long history in Plano, though the lodge nearly closed completely.
The Plano Odd Fellows Lodge started in 1870, helping the Freemasons and other fraternal groups build the first cemetery in Plano.
“The main purpose was if you had a poor family and they didn’t have any money, how are you going to handle burying your loved ones or handling all the expenses,” he says. “So it was a charitable act by all those organizations to help those in the community.”
The lodge was active from 1870 to 1983, earning a plaque outside of its former Downtown Plano building, now the A. R. Schell Agency.
“For years, I would walk by the plaque that’s on the old building there and I kept thinking, ‘It would be nice to bring that back to my community,’” Stephenson says. “I heard lots of stories from my family and I knew all the good work that they used to do.”
Stephenson got together with some friends in 2017, aiming to bring back the organization.
In May 2018, they got a charter with 10-15 active members. Today, the group has over 40 members, with an average age range from 20s to 40s.
Previously, the group has worked with domestic violence shelter Hope’s Door New Beginnings, City House and highway cleanups.
“It’s a success story, it was a good idea to bring the fellowship back to Plano,” Stephenson says.
The group regularly meets to discuss ways to help those in the community and in each other’s lives. At one meeting last year, Stephenson mentioned Ryder.
“I’ve been connected with the Molepske family since the fourth grade,” he says. “[Ryder’s dad] is basically a brother-from-another-mother.”
Ryder has had severe lung disease since he was a toddler, but in 2023 he had to be put on oxygen and go on the transplant list. His family moved to Houston to be closer to Texas Children’s Hospital.
The group held a Bags & Brews Cornhole Tournament at the Plano Elks Lodge to raise money for the family’s medical and travel expenses for Ryder’s transplant.
Though the lodge had never done a fundraiser of that magnitude before, they raised almost $10,000, which spurred the idea to make the event annual to benefit other families.
“People were really generous of heart,” Stephenson says. “We really lucked out because we all came together.”
