‘A humble, daring, and eloquent banner’

    

time.com

Today is Flag Day in the United States. This is a holiday, but not a federal holiday that would close government offices and financial institutions. Flag Day has been a traditional observance in American life since 1916; while that may not compute to a great span of years, we today definitely inhabit a completely different world that eschews traditions. To almost all appearances, we have become a people conditioned to indifference toward our nationality and our symbols because of some alleged guilt for which we are supposed to atone in perpetual despair.

Why observe on June 14? It was on that date in 1777 when the Second Continental Congress voted to make the Stars and Stripes our country’s flag.

It was Woodrow Wilson who issued the presidential proclamation in 1916 to “rededicate ourselves to the Nation, ‘one and inseparable,’ from which every thought that is not worthy of our fathers’ first vows of independence, liberty, and right shall be excluded, and in which we shall stand with united hearts for an America which no man can corrupt, no influence draw away from its ideals, no force divide against itself, a Nation equally distinguished among all the nations of mankind for its clear, individual conception alike of its duties and its privileges, its obligations and its rights.”

The fourteenth of June was not designated Flag Day by law until 1949, when President Truman signed House Joint Resolution 170.

Between 1916 and 1949, New York Freemasonry made its own rules which, it could be argued, were befitting of those times. Grand Master Robert H. Robinson, speaking to Grand Lodge assembled in Masonic Hall on May 2, 1922, said in reflection on the previous year:

On June 14, 1921, National Flag Day was celebrated by Masonic lodges in nearly every corner of the State, and it is our hope that this birthday of our Flag may every year be made a veritable feast day in the Craft. Masonry inculcates loyalty to State and Nation, and it is for us, as citizens of our beloved country, to keep ever alive the wisdom, the loyalty, and the patriotism of our forefathers. I quote from a memorable document on “Your Flag and Mine”:

“If anything in the world symbolizes the realization of the dream and aspirations of men, it is surely the Stars and Stripes. It has been said that young men dream dreams and old men see visions, but never before in the whole history of our race had the prophetic souls of men more surely recognized the coming of a new and better age than when Old Glory was first flung to the breeze.

 

“It is the symbol of the hopes, the aspirations, the struggles, the sufferings, the victories, the happiness, the progress-in short, the very lives of more than one hundred million people.

 

“The world has never known a banner more humble in its origin, yet more daring in its conception, and more eloquent in its appeal to the hearts and minds of men the world over. For nearly a century and a half it has flung forth a message to liberty-loving peoples of all lands, bidding them welcome to a land of opportunity, a land where there are neither kings nor czars, princes nor peasants, a land where all men are brothers with equal liberty and justice for all. And its message has been heard and answered.

 

“There were but 3,000,000 persons, or about one-half of the present population of New York City, in the entire United States when the flag sent forth its message over land and sea, and the civilized world laughed cynically at the ‘great experiment.’ But men’s hearts thrilled and are still thrilling at the great experiment which has become the embodiment of the greatest ideal in government the world has ever known. Men came and tasted of liberty and found that it was good.

 

“Today, more than 100,000,000 Americans—men, women, children—stand ready to defend their ideal with their lives, if need be, even as the little handful of patriots 140 years ago fought and died for the same ideal. Whether they be newcomers or citizens whose forefathers sought refuge on these shores, it matters not now. Americans by birth and Americans by adoption make common cause of the Flag and the ideal for which it stands.”

My honored successor, I am sure, will have a message for you this coming Flag Day couched in his own fearless and inspiring words. I cannot myself lose this opportunity of impressing upon you, men of the Grand Lodge, the nobility and far reaching effect a yearly general celebration of Flag Day would have upon the life and vitality of our Craft, and if there is nothing else in the address read to you this afternoon that invites your attention, I beg your earnest, your patriotic, and your liberty-loving loyalty to the glorification of “your flag and mine,” our glorious banner of liberty.

MW Arthur Tompkins

Robinson’s “honored successor” was MW Arthur Tompkins (the brilliant visionary who signed my lodge’s warrant!) Several weeks later, he encouraged New York’s lodges to commemorate Flag Day. At his direction, Grand Lodge’s Bureau of Social and Educational Service provided lodges ideas for programs they could adopt, plus books, poems, and other relevant literature, including an essay of 6,000 words on the subject of the U.S. flag.

“The display of bunting by Masons throughout the State added materially to the observance of the day and patriotic exercises were conducted in many of the Lodges,” MW Townsend Scudder, chairman, said in his report on the matter.

And, in fact, on Flag Day 1921—at this very minute, actually—Sea and Field Lodge 1 hosted a Flag Day observance inside the Grand Lodge Room. Secretary William C. Prime reported to Grand Lodge how “upwards of 2,000 Master Masons from the Metropolitan District and neighborhood, at which addresses were made by Hon. Martin W. Littleton, Brother Job E. Hedges, by Rear Admiral Reynold T. Hall, Gen. Barbour, and by Bishop Wm. T. Manning. A large delegation of servicemen attended with colors, which were massed with appropriate ceremony, and the occasion was one of dignity, as befitted it, and truly memorable.”

There are many more details to share, but you get the point. My point in this edition of The Magpie Mason is I believe we have lost something. Of course our fraternity is much smaller today, so there is less talent and fewer hands to set to labor, but we unintentionally have accommodated modernity too much in our thinking. We ought to be honoring Flag Day right now. We have more than 400 lodges. Are any marking today’s holiday? I haven’t heard of any.

Our city tonight is polluted with other flags, symbols that divide people, shout for fringe cultic identities, and even encourage warfare. Our gentle Craft possesses an antidote to much of what ails society, and that the simple symbolism of a Flag Day celebration can signal to a weary and uncertain public that they are not alone—that unity with other citizens can be found.

     

‘The first law of the lodge’

    

At the Fourth Manhattan District’s Protocol Class yesterday.

You think you know something about Freemasonry, but then attend a Masonic Protocol class.

That’s where the Magpie Mason was twenty-four hours ago, joining three lodge brothers and others from the Fourth Manhattan District at Masonic Hall for instruction in the finer points of dos and don’ts. Actually, I shouldn’t have written “lodge brothers.” It’s lodge brethren.

If you think yourself above protocol instruction because you’ve read Waite, Wilmshurst and whatever, get used to the idea of being wrong about that. Approaching my twenty-seventh anniversary in Freemasonry, even I was very curious about what would be imparted to us yesterday. Sure, I knew most of the material already—even I can learn osmotically over time—but a lot of it contradicted what I had learned earlier in life as a—cough—“New Jersey Mason,” and some of it was new to me.

It was in 1924 when Grand Lodge, at the suggestion of MW Arthur S. Tompkins, made the Bible presentation part of lodge life. ‘I am glad to report that my recommendation…has been adopted by many lodges,’ he said before Grand Lodge in May of that year. ‘I hope it may become a universal custom, one that shall indelibly impress upon the mind of every new Mason the fact that the Holy Bible is the Great Light in Masonry; that the doctrine of the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man is the cornerstone of our fraternity; and that our first duty to is to God, and the Sacred Book should be the lamp to our feet and a light to our paths.’ 

“We study Protocol because we are convinced of its powers to help maintain harmony,” said RW Bro. Tomas Hull, Grand Director of Ceremonies. “It is a form of courtesy to the individual and a manifestation of respect to the Craft. Harmony is the first law of the lodge. Where discord enters, Freemasonry leaves.”

In the I Knew That category, for examples:

 - No one may tread across the Master’s Carpet.

 - No smoking, food, or drink is permitted in the lodge room.

 - The Inner Door may be used only during degrees.

In the Contradictions Department:

 - Never say “Blue Lodge” or “Symbolic Lodge,” but say “Master Mason Lodge” or “Masonic Lodge.”

 - Do not say “Worshipful Sir” or any other “Sir.” (I’ll never be able to break that habit!)

 - Do not say “To you and through you.” (I can break that habit.)

Under New (to me) Material:

 - There are no “Open Installations” or other events, but instead are “Public.”

 - Do not say “grace the East,” which I’ve never heard before.

 - Do not say “Sitting Master,” although I never knew where that came from anyway.

There was an awful lot more. As my lodge’s tiler, much of the instruction was idiomatic to my responsibilities. Make sure you avail yourself of this and the other courses offered in your district!

     

‘100 years of Publicity 1000’

     

The founding brethren of Publicity Lodge 1000 on the night of the Charter and Constitution Ceremony, Monday, October 30, 1922. The ceremony took place in the Grand Lodge Room of Masonic Hall, but I’m not sure where this photo was shot. Sorry for the glare. This is a photo of a framed picture and the chandeliers are reflecting.

It was a hundred years ago today, at this very hour in fact, that my lodge was made legal by the Grand Lodge of New York.

On the evening of Monday, October 30, 1922, inside the Grand Lodge Room of Masonic Hall, Publicity Lodge 1000 was constituted and its officers installed by a ritual team consisting of Grand Master Arthur S. Tompkins, Deputy Grand Master William A. Rowan, Senior Grand Warden Meyer B. Cushner, Junior Grand Warden Terry M. Townsend, Grand Treasurer Jacob C. Klick, Grand Secretary Robert H. Robinson, Grand Chaplain Oscar F. Trader, and Grand Marshal John J. MacCrum.

The first meeting Under Dispensation,
Thursday, December 29, 1921.

The lodge was organized by advertising and other media professionals. According to legend, a number of them were acquainted professionally and socially (maybe through the Advertising Club of New York), but it was some time before they realized many in the group were Freemasons. Upon that discovery, they set about organizing a lodge. Grand Master Robert H. Robinson issued the Dispensation, and the first meeting U.D. was held Thursday, December 29, 1921.

It is unsurprising Publicity’s birth was covered by trade publications serving the publishing world. The November 4, 1922 edition of The Fourth Estate newspaper reported:

An interesting event in advertising circles was the constitution of Publicity Lodge No. 1000 F&AM on October 30.

Arthur S. Tompkins

This lodge is made up of advertising men. It was organized a year ago, and operating under dispensation until it received its charter and was regularly constituted by the Grand Lodge officially Monday evening. The ceremony, which took place in the Masonic Temple at 23rd Street and Sixth Avenue, New York, was conducted by Supreme Court Judge Arthur S. Tompkins of Nyack, who is Grand Master of Masons in the State of New York, and a large suite of other Grand Lodge officers.

There was a large attendance of Masons from other lodges. The ceremony was simple but impressive. St. Cecile quartet furnished the music. Addresses were made by the Past Grand Master Robert H. Robinson, and on George Washington as a Mason by Grand Master Tompkins. The Master and a delegation from St. Nicholas Lodge presented the new lodge with a handsome ballot box. Several charter members of Publicity came from St. Nicholas.

Our original VSL.

The new lodge has 53 charter members, a long list of members who have taken the First Degree, and another long list of applicants. It meets in the Grand Lodge room in Masonic Hall, 23rd Street at Sixth Avenue.

Herman G. Halsted, of Paul Block, Inc., is Master.

John H. Baumann, of Stevens & Baumann, is Senior Warden.

Louis W. Bleser, of Charles C. Green Advertising, is Treasurer.

George French is Secretary.

The November 11, 1922 issue of Editor & Publisher reported:

The ceremony of constitution was attended by many Masons from other New York lodges, and visitors from abroad, including the Past Grand Master of Masons of Nova Scotia. The Master of Saint Nicholas Lodge No. 321, accompanied by a delegation of members, was present and presented Publicity with a handsome ballot box.

E&P also included Publicity among its Ad Clubs and Associations listings.

Herman G. Halsted

RW Herman G. Halsted was born June 16, 1876 in Orange, New Jersey, according to Who’s Who in New York City and State for 1924. He was DDGM of the Third Manhattan District. He also was a Scottish Rite Mason and a Royal Arch Mason in Jerusalem Chapter 8.

How did Publicity grab the Number 1000, the huge milestone and a most memorable cardinal number? It’s not exactly a sequential lodge number. Bay Side Lodge 999 was constituted on May 9, 1922; St. Mark’s Lodge 1001 somehow was constituted the day before that; and Lodge 1000 received its warrant nearly six months later! For a fraternity that inculcates study of Arithmetic among the Liberal Arts and Sciences, this appears amiss.

Publicity Lodge lore explains that because the Roman numeral M equals our number 1000, it was planned for us to receive that number. What’s so great about M? In advertising copy writing, the copy writer adds an M at the end of his copy, center page, to inform the editor there is nothing more to read. (How the advertising business chose M for that purpose may be unknown today.)

And speaking of writing and editing, MW Tompkins also advanced the idea of an official periodical for New York Masons. It would be titled The New York Masonic Outlook. This was a novel idea as grand lodges did not have in-house magazines for their members, but in the 1920s, all things became possible. Masonic membership in the United States surged during and after World War I and through the twenties, reaching 3.5 million before the disaster of the Great Depression. The multitudes of Master Masons resulted in lodges proliferating coast to coast. More real estate was acquired and developed. More charities were established. The appendant bodies flourished. Supporting industries providing regalia, paraphernalia, and other goods profited. There was more of everything, so there was money to establish a magazine for New York Freemasonry too.

It didn’t take Grand Lodge long to hire the best available editor to bring the Outlook to fruition. Harry LeRoy “H.L.” Haywood (1886-1956) was among the top Masonic authors whose books are valued for their clear prose to help the reader grasp Masonry’s sometimes arcane and vexing subjects. He also was renowned for editing The Builder, published by the National Masonic Research Society, that was not only a magazine, but was the centerpiece of a correspondence course in Masonic education. Haywood arrived in New York and, seeking the most talented available help in starting a magazine from scratch, he affiliated with—who else?—Publicity Lodge 1000.

Because the world outside has changed in infinite ways since 1922—people then could not comprehend what we today take for granted—it is especially appreciated how Publicity Lodge remains mostly unchanged. Our styles of dress and appearance evolved, and even our ritual has been altered a little, but our sacred retreat of friendship and virtue steadfastly upholds the meaning of Masonry. Here’s to another hundred years!

M

     

‘The great mission of our fraternity’

    

The hundredth anniversary of the constitution of my lodge is a month away, so I am reading about that occasion and about the concurrent activities of Freemasonry in the State of New York. The latter is particularly impressive.

The Grand Lodge of New York obviously was a huge jurisdiction. Its lodges numbered 921 and had 272,634 Master Masons on the rolls in 1922-23. And it was a force internationally, having chartered lodges in Finland and Romania, with more planned in Hungary.

Europe’s wounds from the First World War were still being triaged, and the Grand Lodge became a leader in trying to establish an international federation of Masonic grand lodges to reconnect the fraternal bonds severed by the war. Ultimately, the Masonic International Association, the first of its kind in the Order’s history, did not come to fruition, but the Grand Lodge of New York was alone among the forty-nine U.S. jurisdictions to make the effort. Grand Master Arthur Tompkins, in his address to the Grand Lodge at the close of that term, said:

MW Arthur S. Tompkins

The spirit of strife is abroad in the world. National hatred, racial hatred, class prejudices, religious hatred, and individual hatreds are the curse of humanity and a blight upon the civilization of the twentieth century, and the world needs the influences of religion and the precepts of the Great Light in Masonry and the practical application of the Doctrine of the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man to cure its ills and heal its wounds and calm the passions and subdue the prejudices of men and classes of men and nations and to bring concord, peace, and happiness to all nations. These are the only forces that can reach and regenerate the hearts of men and transform their brutal, selfish, and intolerance instincts into the attributes of love and service and toleration, and we American nations should welcome every opportunity to extend our activities and influences throughout the world….

Why cannot Masonry cooperate throughout the world to help suffering humanity and save the civilization now in jeopardy?

American Freemasonry, with all its prosperity and strength, owes to the Masons of all the countries of the world its sympathy, cooperation, the influence of its ideals, the power of its example, and the benefits of its counsel and leadership. We American Masons should not confine our activities and benefactions to our own country and our own national problems. The Masons of Europe are looking to us for leadership, and I believe that a union of all the Masonic forces in the world will be a great power, a potential force, for the promotion of the spirit of fraternity and brotherhood, peace and goodwill and may materially aid in the moral reconstruction of the world.

It’s a grandiose message to the modern ear. Quite a shift in Masonry’s focus from how Tompkins expressed it then to today. Now it isn’t even “our own national problems” (if only), but is merely the fraternity’s organizational maladies. But a century ago was patriotic times. The Grand Lodge made Masonic holidays of Flag Day and George Washington’s Masonic birthday for the lodges to celebrate. MW Tompkins urged the lodges to support public education, calling it “the cornerstone and bulwark of our liberties, and the only sure guarantee of our stability and perpetuity as a republic.” (Talk about changing times!) And, of course, there was the recent establishment of the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Memorial Hospital.

Outside the sacred retreat, Arthur Tompkins was a major figure in civic and political life. A party chairman, a holder of judgeships, a U.S. Congressman. During the years he served as deputy grand master and grand master of the Grand Lodge of New York, Arthur S. Tompkins also was a New York Supreme Court justice. From what I’ve read, Tompkins simply could have asked for his party’s gubernatorial nomination in 1926, but he did not, and he endorsed another judge. In the thirties, near the end of his life, Tompkins was an associate justice of the Appellate Division.

And, yes, he was related to Daniel D. Tompkins; theirs was a family that established roots in America in the 1640s.

On Americanism, he was an idealist. In that same speech to the Grand Lodge, he concluded:

I have heard it stated by overzealous Masons that our government is a Masonic government. If by that they mean that Masons had much to do with the early history of our Republic, its birth and growth, they are right, but if intended in the broader sense, they are wrong and such statements are only calculated to cause controversy and resentment. We hear people talk about a white man’s government, and a Protestant government. These statements are true only in the sense that there are more white people and more Protestants in our country than there are people of other colors and creeds. Our Government is not exclusively a white man’s government, or a Catholic, or a Protestant or a Jewish or a Gentile Government, in the sense that the liberties, privileges, opportunities, and all the good things of the American Republic are for one class alone or that one class or race or creed may dominate all others in respect of their liberties, rights and privileges, and never will be such a Government if the ideals and purposes of the patriot fathers, the founders of our Republic, are perpetuated. Ours is a great democracy, made up of all kinds and classes, from all nations and all tongues and creeds. It is a Government as Lincoln declared “of the people, by the people and for the people,” of and by and for all the people, Jew and Gentile, Protestant and Catholic, white and black, and we cannot set up class against class, labor against capital, Protestant against Catholic, Jew against Gentile, the white man against the black man, without impairing the stability and imperiling the perpetuity of our Republic. Our democracy cannot permanently endure unless all classes, creeds, and races are allowed to live and work and worship freely and peaceably under the equal protection of the law. Any movement that is calculated to fan and intensify the fires of religious bigotry or class antagonisms or race prejudices will be deprecated and deplored by men who love their country and who want to keep it noble and make its future greater. There are peaceful and lawful agencies for the punishment of crime, the protection of individual and property rights, the redress of wrong, the vindication of the right and the preservation of our institutions and all the things that we Masons hold dear. Let us then be true to our Masonic faith and by precept and example, by loyalty and steadfastness, strive to allay the bitterness, to close the breach, to heal the wounds that have been and are being caused by these unfortunate and unnecessary antagonisms. Let our aim and all our influence be for a universal brotherhood and a world-wide peace, that is the great mission of our fraternity.

Arthur Tompkins cocktail

In my brief reading on Arthur Sydney Tompkins, I see how he was a serious cigar lover, and that the Rockland Tobacco Company of Nyack sold a cigar named Judge Tompkins Corona with the tagline “A Supreme Cigar Verdict.” I also stumbled across the existence of a cocktail named Arthur Tompkins. I haven’t yet found its history (nor have I pinned down his politics vis-à-vis Prohibition), so I can’t conclude it is named for our past grand master, but I’ll keep looking. The recipe is simple though:

 Photos courtesy cocktailpro

     

‘Our 101st installation’

    

Monday night was the occasion of the 101st Installation of Officers at Publicity Lodge 1000. Vivat!

It was on Monday, October 30, 1922 when Grand Master Arthur Tompkins, assisted by the elected grand line, plus a grand chaplain and the grand marshal, constituted Publicity and installed its officers. The November 11, 1922 edition of Editor & Publisher reports: “The ceremony of constitution was attended by many Masons from other New York lodges, and visitors from abroad, including the past grand master of Masons of Nova Scotia. The master of Saint Nicholas Lodge No. 321, accompanied by a delegation of members, was present and presented Publicity with a handsome ballot box.” (E&P covered the event because the lodge was founded by media professionals.)

I wonder if that ballot box is the one we currently use. It’s handsome, but doesn’t look that old.

A unique cake for a special night.

What I do know is our lodge is in for a dynamic year. Almost the entire officer line are Masons of relatively few years, having been in the Craft an average of about, I think, five years, except for myself and the Brother Senior Warden who are well past the twenty-year mark. Our Worshipful Master is young in age and in Masonry, and he’s keen on education, and I am to take the lead on that. (I withhold names because I don’t know if they want to be known publicly as Freemasons.) The trestleboard for the year is in the works, and it’s guaranteed to be a busy mix in celebration of our centenary.