‘The 2013 Ingathering’

  
I don’t know if we’re still calling it the Harold V.B. Voorhis Ingathering anymore, but this year’s will take place on Saturday, July 20, and will be hosted by none other than Harold V.B. Voorhis Council No. 260, it was announced by our Grand Superintendent, today.

The Ingathering will take place at the Scottish Rite Valley of Central Jersey, located at 103 Dunns Mill Road in Bordentown (Exit 7 off the New Jersey Turnpike). Meeting to open at 9:30 a.m. and should conclude at about 3:30.

Guest of Honor: Most Venerable Matthew D. Dupee, Sovereign Grand Master of the Grand Council of Allied Masonic Degrees of the USA.

This one will be very different from previous Ingatherings in that three councils from New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania will take turns conferring three degrees: Architect, Grand Architect, and Superintendent.

Advance registration is required. Make your $35 check payable to NJ AMD INGATHERING, and remit to the Grand Superintendent. Leave me a note (not for publication) with your name, e-mail address, and council name in the comments section, and I will get back to you with the mailing address.
  

‘Serious times for The Players’

    

Trevor Stewart delivering the Wendell K. Walker
Lecture, March 24, 2011 at The Players

Declining membership, financial debt, personnel controversies, and enough existential uncertainty to worry its members, neighbors, and admirers are dogging The Players, the venerable private club at Gramercy Park that is a beloved destination of several lodges and other Masonic groups in New York City.

The club even has resorted to selling and pawning its Sargents to pay for capital improvements.

DNAinfo.com-New York has been reporting the sad story, with numerous heart-breaking details, for more than three weeks. Read all about it here. I know this will interest many of the brethren, ergo this edition of The Magpie Mason.
    

‘Isaac Newton and King Solomon’s Temple’

  
Two rules of thumb: 1) If you’re a regular reader of this website, you’re a guy who has nothing to do on a Friday night; and b) Bro. Lenny Lubitz is our kind of Freemason. Combine these two factoids and you have plans for tonight.

I don’t know Lenny well, but he’s one of the Masons who “gets it.” I keep bumping into him here and there. The book club up in Bergen County. The research lodge in New York City. ICHF.

Lenny is a Past Master of Abravanel Lodge No. 1116 in New York, and tonight at Atlas-Pythagoras he will discuss “Isaac Newton and King Solomon’s Temple.” The lecture is open to Apprentices and Fellows. Lodge opens at 7:30.
  

‘Pennsylvania Lodge of Research’

  

Founding Members jewel.

I’m just on my way out the door to attend the Wendell K. Walker Lecture tonight, but not before I spread the news of the next meeting of Pennsylvania Lodge of Research on Saturday, June 29 at Lehigh Lodge in Macungie.

Pennsylvania Lodge of Research will meet Saturday, June 29 at Lehigh Lodge No. 326 in Macungie.

I’ve never been able to catch one of these meetings. The lodge is to meet twice each year, with additional meetings at the discretion of the Master, and I think there always is one meeting in eastern Pennsylvania, but somehow I’ve never made it there. This will be a busy weekend. The American Lodge of Research will meet the night before in Manhattan, and Bro. Piers is hosting his annual barbecue on Sunday. (If you haven’t heard, he graciously moved it from Saturday to Sunday in appreciation of all the Masonic goings on scheduled for Saturday.)

Looking forward to it all... and then to a quiet summer punctuated only by the AMD Ingathering (more to come on that ambitious project!) and maybe the MRF conference in New Hampshire too, but I’m undecided on that one.

Officers apron.

One thing at a time, as we try to explain to the youngest Entered Apprentice. Pennsylvania Lodge of Research will open at 10 a.m. that day. Lehigh Lodge is located at 2120 Route 100 in Macungie, which is not prohibitively far into the Keystone State for us New Jersey guys. It’s only about 90 miles from the headquarters of Magpie Industries, which is notably nearer than Philly, so I got that going for me.