‘Happy Garibaldi anniversary’

    

Just in time for Garibaldi Lodge’s 160th anniversary year, a pipe maker, that I unhappily cannot identify, seems to have produced a briar bearing the handsome likeness of Giuseppe Garibaldi. This photo shows a page in the October issue of Arbiter magazine. It is being circulated on social media by Al Pascià to promote its Ovalina shape, two of which are seen resting on the page. Maybe this Garibaldi briar is made by that venerable pipe-maker, but I cannot find any info on the web about it.

Anyway, the actual anniversary of the lodge’s constitution passed on June 11, but the brethren will meet tomorrow night at eight o’clock in the Corinthian Room for its regular communication. (It’s impossible to choose a favorite lodge in the Tenth Manhattan District, but I’m drawn to Garibaldi because of the French Rite EA° it famously confers, in Italian, to the delight of hundreds of visiting Masons.)

Magpie file photo

From the 150th anniversary.

Garibaldi 542 was the first lodge under the Grand Lodge of New York to work in the Italian language. There was confusion in the Craft at the beginning, as the lodge was trilingual—Italian, French, and English—so that the DDGM had to direct the Worshipful Master to keep the lodge’s proceedings in Italian, per the Dispensation granted by Grand Lodge.

The lodge’s namesake, of course, is the Italian freedom-fighter and Grand Master of the Grand Orient of Italy. Did you know Giuseppe Garibaldi resided in Staten Island for a time? Read more about Garibaldi 542’s history here.

Happy anniversary!