Jeff Morley Extensive registration records from the National OA office between 1948-1955 are conclusive of 2 facts: 1) Lodge 405 in Bowling Green, KY was never known by any other name than Land of Big Caves at any time. 2) After approval of it's original charter in December, 1948, for the 1949 Calendar year, Mammoth Cave Council and Land of Big Caves Lodge 405 never renewed its charter or paid dues in 1950, 1951 or 1952. Lodge membership on the original 1948 charter application was listed as 20 members and that was never updated on National records through the time of the Lodge and council merger in 1952, indicating that the national OA Secretary never received a renewal application after the 1948/49 application . A photocopy of a Lodge charter for 1950 (which no longer seems to exist), published in 1987, indicating the Lodge name for Lodge 405 was Walah Elemamekhaki is not substantiated or verified within National OA records, even though that name is a translation of 'great caves' from a Lenni Lanapi dictionary from the 1890's. The acknowledged expert patch collector from Kentucky, Hal Rudd, was a primary editor of the original Blue Books between their inception in 1958-1963. He never disputed the listing of Lodge 405 only as Land of Big Caves, nor did he ever attempt to correct that lodge name. The Wabaningo Lodge Emblem Handbook, published in 1952, listed the name of lodge 405 as Land of Big Caves as did official National OA listings from 1949-1952. That same 1987 publication showing a 1950 charter of a different name also affirmatively concluded the 405 R patch of the 'Walah' name that surfaced in the hobby in 1963-64 was genuine, a conclusion that was disputed by the Arapaho II catalogs from the late 1970's and subsequently, supported by extensive evidence, proven to be false in 2023. There is no longer any dispute that the 405 R1 within the patch collecting hobby is and always was a fake. Unfortunately, the photocopy of the '1950 charter' was also associated with the same individuals who cast the fake 405 R onto the hobby. It can not be ruled out this 1950 charter is also fake, used to legitimize the 405 R patch by the same fakers? Understandably, there has been great sentimental attachment over the last 60 years among collectors from Kentucky and elsewhere that first, the 405 R1 was real and secondly, that Lodge 405 changed it's name from Land of Big Caves to Walah Elemamekhaki. Sadly, based on real evidence, none of this proves to be true. It does, however, make for great folklore! To view images of real documentation from the National OA office, newspaper articles, & historical collectors' journals, see the YoutTube video entitled Land of Big Caves Lodge 405 -70 years of confusion, at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--CqqQRDwyA&list=PL4HqvAbthNDo0c1L7VigrVWMB0VprIIZE&index=2 17 days ago