Two quarter-fold circulars and three loose slips, approx. 6 x 3.25 inches; with tri-fold application form, 8.5 x 5.5 inches (unfolded). Near Fine with minor age toning. Circular and "Monthly Report" both dated June 1, 1888. "Great offer" of reduced rates extended for distributed 20 circulars, "As we have no agent in your town." Based in Minnesota, but open to residents of all states and territories. Includes a partial list of members, including a few women, though the material primarily targets men. The society promised a payout after subscribers got married (with murky contingencies and exceptions). Billed as "the oldest marriage endowment in the United States," the company fell into disrepute by 1891 and was condemned that year in the Annual Report of the Minnesota Insurance Commissioner, which claimed, "The officers of said society are apparently guilty of gross fraud in several instances..." but they were unable to litigate. The secretary tried to redirects funds and ultimately tried to pivot and rename the organization "Federal Investment Company." The Annual Report called the business "nothing more nor less than an infamous lottery scheme and should be amenable to the federal anti lottery law."

No OCLC holdings for any material under the organization’s name and little evidence of the organization in online resources, except a cautionary article published in a Swedish-American newspaper in 1891 (excerpt, via Google translate):

"...we have been particularly asked by a good man to speak black words about a Minnesota society that had deceived him, and to make one last attempt to keep other people from falling into the same trap that had cost him a good deal of his hard-earned money. First he joined the Northwestern Mutual Endowment Society and duly made his monthly payments. After a while the office of that excellent society was closed by order of the State Insurance Commissioner. But they neglected to inform our friend, so he continued to send in his contributions. Finally, a letter came from the secretary of the society, a gentleman named James Tonkin, whose handwriting and manner of writing English should be enough to deter anyone who would have liked to have anything to do with the association he represents. In a printed circular Tonkin announced that the said association had ceased to exist, and that he himself had founded a new such association, called the “Federal Investment Company,” which gives even more flamboyant ideas and brilliant reflections of the fathers than those which the former association purported to present to a gullible public. In a handwritten, now probably illegible, crudely written letter Tonkin urged us to join the new association, in which he offered him membership on the most incredibly advantageous terms, stating as an enticement that we could realize $237 in a year, without even having to get married, something which is otherwise a basic condition for the members of the association, insofar as they want to receive their money. All we had to do to escape this condition was to enlist among our friends customers of the society, and he would then receive a cash compensation for each new member he acquired. Tonkin later wrote a couple of letters, just as pitiful to read as the first. He tried, as he said, to persuade us to remain in the society. In one letter it was promised that his certificate would be worth $255 after a year. But in spite of all this, we have renounced all connection with Tonkin's society and consider the $2 or $300, which he has already sent, as pure loss, which will never be replaced. It is not worth saying any more about the matter."

Vestkusten, Number 45, 6 November 1891