‘RW Thomas Jackson, R.I.P.’

    

Magpie file photo

Freemasonry’s most outspoken and indefatigable proponent for upholding standards of excellence from the West Gate to the Grand East has died. RW Thomas W. Jackson was a Pennsylvania Freemason, but he was lionized across the Masonic world for his principled insistence that this fraternity must stop self-injuring by its neglecting the very ideas that have been key to Masonic identity for centuries. He was 87.

In speech after speech, essay after essay, book after book, Jackson held up a mirror to his brethren, challenging us to recognize how Freemasonry’s loss of prestige in society stems precisely from the initiate first, ask questions later mindset that has given lodges an uninspiring generic fraternal club personality. “Essentially, we don’t know our origins, but Freemasonry attracted some of the greatest men of the last 300 years,” he often said. “Did Freemasonry make men great, or did great men make Freemasonry? I say it is both. Voltaire, Mozart, Haydn, Franklin, and Washington were men we wanted to be associated with. That is our deficit today in North America. Where are the Mozarts of today? My role is to preserve Freemasonry in case great men come later.”

He did more than keep the lights on; Tom Jackson reflected the Light. He showed a path forward.

Displaying Masonic awards. (Shippensburg News-Chronicle)

In his home state, he labored as Grand Secretary for nineteen years. He was a principal in Pennsylvania’s research lodge, its first Observant lodge, and, of course, its Academy of Masonic Knowledge. (I believe it was at PAMK where we first met twelve or more years ago.) At the national leadership level, Tom was, among many other things, a Blue Friar (No. 93), a prolific book reviewer for ages in The Northern Light, and a tireless traveler from conference to symposium to lodge meeting, ceaselessly evangelizing his inspiring message of how you and I can restore Freemasonry’s magnificence if we only would follow the clear teachings we received in the first place.

Tom Jackson’s ideas were not always welcome. Buy me a beer sometime, and I’ll tell you about the harrowing threat he received several years ago.

Masonic Philatelic Club

Nor did his influence stop at our nation’s shores; Tom, in effect, was the leader of the World Conference of Masonic Grand Lodges, albeit reluctantly, for years. Brazil, where Freemasonry is revered, put him on a postage stamp, for heaven’s sake.

Thomas Jackson was a Founding Fellow of the Masonic Society.

Please remember Linda, his wife of 56 years, in your devotions. I don’t doubt Cumberland Valley Lodge 315 will conduct a Masonic obsequy. It’ll be well attended.

“He was a man. Take him for all in all. I shall not look upon his like again.”