Showing posts with label Cory Sigler. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cory Sigler. Show all posts

Friday, August 8, 2014

‘Book review: Brothers of a Vow’

     
Through the kind offices of Bro. Cory Sigler, editor and publisher of The Working Tools magazine, my review of Ami Pflugrad-Jackisch’s Brothers of a Vow appears in the August issue and here too. It took me four years to get this done (long story) and into print, so I offer it here for Flashback Friday.


Brothers of a Vow: Secret Fraternal Orders and the Transformation of White Male Culture in Antebellum Virginia
By Ami Pflugrad-Jackisch
The University of Georgia Press, 2010
ISBN-13: 978-0-8203-3227-7
181 pp.


In a concise history of only 123 pages (with another 56 for Appendix, Endnotes, and Bibliography) researcher Dr. Ami Pflugrad-Jackisch, History Department Chair of University of Michigan-Flint, focuses on a specific, but hugely revealing aspect of fraternal life in America. She illustrates what it meant to be a member of an exclusive fraternal order in Virginia during the decades leading to the U.S. Civil War, a period of great socio-economic and political change that recast white masculine identity in the South’s largest slave-based economy. By delving into membership records of Freemasonry, Odd Fellows, and Sons of Temperance, as well as historical archives and news accounts of the Old Dominion in the early nineteenth century, the author shows how fraternal life within the lodge and daily life without dramatically influenced each other, giving rise to a civil society striving for modernity. Brothers of a Vow is presented in three parts. First comes the context of white male society in antebellum Virginia. It’s not what you may think. Economic opportunity, civil rights, and advantageous social status were enjoyed nearly exclusively by the propertied, wealthy elites. Secondly, she assesses the force that fraternities there exerted in society by imparting their values and conferring measures of status on their members. The secret societies created a reality wherein one’s character and conduct could win him a better life, infusing momentum into the parchment promises of all men being equal. In the third act, Pflugrad-Jackisch reconciles those two dynamics to show the emergence in the 1850s of a new Virginia driven by increased prosperity and liberalized civil rights, and a return to the public square of fraternal orders’ proud brethren. The significance of her findings is impressive, especially since the reader knows of the disaster looming in the ensuing decade.

Antebellum Virginia’s socio-economic transition is key to the story. Fraternity members today tend not to think how the world outside impacts their lodges, except in extreme upheavals like the Morgan Affair and economic collapse, but changes in civil society affect secret societies. An Indiana Freemason may grumble about the fraternity’s prohibition of alcohol, without realizing the Grand Lodge enacted the rule at a time in the late nineteenth century when the temperance movement swayed millions to shun liquor. Your lodge may opt for electric tapers about the altar not from aesthetic ineptitude, but because the fire marshal or the insurance agent says so. Your lodge’s tax status is the result of the Internal Revenue Code of the United States, not your treasurer. So too in pre-Civil War Virginia, forces beyond any man’s or group’s control decided the futures of Freemasonry, Odd Fellowship, and the Sons of Temperance.

“If Virginia had remained a primarily agrarian society throughout the antebellum era,” the author postulates, “perhaps the herrenvolk democracy [government by ethnic/racial majority] that proslavery advocates envisioned would have fostered harmony among white men. During the 1840s, however, the state underwent a series of important social, economic, and political transformations that altered the nature of its society, hastened its transition to a market economy, and engendered the growth of towns and cities.” During the 1830s, about 80 percent of white, male Virginians were employed in agriculture, but change, driven by construction of roads, canals, railways, and other infrastructure, created a new economy. Virginia’s cities became interconnected, and trade with Washington, Philadelphia, and Baltimore became common for merchants. Communications with cities further north was inevitable. Upward mobility allowed some artisans and mechanics to quickly improve their standings by becoming shopkeepers and factory owners. The middle class. “Between 1830 and 1850, urban centers across the state expanded, and the free white populations of Richmond and Petersburg doubled as young white male cabinetmakers, carriage makers, blacksmiths, hatters, and other artisans moved to cities in order to fulfill the growing needs of middle-class consumers. Work for skilled tradesmen abounded in urban areas as new warehouses, marketplaces, and other physical structures had to be constructed to keep pace with the new market economy in Virginia. Skilled white laborers also found work in small factories, flour mills, and iron foundries, and as overseers in tobacco factories, while a new class of merchants, shopkeepers, agents, clerks, and other businessmen grew up around the state’s expanding commercial sector.” Those who did not prosper in the new market economy included many white men who were relegated to unskilled labor and to competing with slaves who were hired out by their owners to fill specialized labor tasks. Whichever fate one faced, what was inevitable was the closing window of opportunity to become a property owner through farming and slave-owning. The new Virginia white male depended less on prestigious family name and title to land, and more on his own wits, industry, and moral fiber.

In this social and economic revolution, with thousands of men leaving their hometowns for the promise of better days in cities, these rootless strangers were compelled to make their own identities in ways as virtuous as possible. A man’s word was his bond in personal and commercial matters, making his cultivation of reputation essential for success anywhere. The lodge, Masonic or other, was a force for ensuring the quality of men. The process for joining a Masonic lodge then was much as it is today, although with tougher scrutiny of who eventually would be initiated. “Investigations and those who vouched for the character of applicants were asked to consider whether or not they would feel comfortable lending the applicant large sums of money, if they could trust him to protect and ‘intermingle’ with their families in times of crisis (particularly their wives and daughters), and if, upon their death, they would trust the applicant to visit their bedside or oversee their funeral arrangements.”

This quality control paid dividends, as lodge brothers, without necessarily knowing each other, were confident in one another’s stability and reliability because their fraternal orders were based on equality and merit. Simultaneously, in the fraternities’ interactions with the public, it was made clear that the selective nature of lodge membership meant that lodge members constituted a choice stratum of society. “The fraternities stressed the importance of a man’s integrity rather than his economic status” and served as social levelers, bringing together men who otherwise would not have had chance to know each other. In the new Virginia, it was lodge, not land, that placed value on upwardly mobile white males, and it was an identity many men craved.

Other benefits of fraternal life, of course, included the charity extended to distressed brethren, and shows of fraternal identity in public. “Sick and death benefits were another new feature of antebellum fraternalism,” says Pflugrad-Jackisch, reminding us that what we often take for granted today was not always so. “In the post-Revolutionary era, the Freemasons had provided special money to help brothers in need, raised funds to educate Masonic orphans, and buried deceased brothers. However, it was during the antebellum period that the Masons created a more centralized system for the collection and distribution of charitable funds. The Odd Fellows were the first to combine a centralized mutual benefit system with secret fraternal rituals in the late 1830s, and other newly created antebellum orders quickly followed suit.” These systems of assistance no doubt contributed to the growth of these fraternal orders at a time in history before charitable institutions and, certainly, government agencies became the vehicles for helping the needy we know today. It simply was a huge deal for a respectable, but not particularly wealthy, middle class man to have a large showing of regalia-attired mourners performing his funerary rites in full view of the public at the church graveyard, something once reserved for military figures and other honored citizens.

With this new society on the rise, it would not be possible for public laws to remain as established in the original Virginia of the early American republic and previously. The right to vote was held by those who owned land, called freeholders. Wherever you live, there is a good chance the elected legislators of your county are called freeholders, a title that dates to the time in American society when only property owners could vote and steer the power of government. But, “by creating a network of white neighborhoods, the fraternities constructed a space outside the political arena where white men could envision an alternative definition of white male independence based on men’s moral conduct rather than on the ownership of land or slaves.” The status quo in 1829 denied suffrage to white men universally because men who worked for a living “were comparable to slaves” in that both groups were “subject to the will of others for their own subsistence.” The “peasantry” could not be entrusted with political affairs. It wasn’t only about electing politicians; the right to vote decided how public monies were spent on infrastructure, resulting in the aristocratic east of Virginia benefitting from public works that made life and commerce easier. “By 1849, the calls for a new state constitution had become deafening” and the legislators of Virginia soon elected to extend suffrage to “every white male citizen of the Commonwealth of the age of twenty-one years.” The meritocracy of the lodge, where leaders were elected according to their abilities and virtues (and where discussion of partisan politics was forbidden), had been translated into basic rights for lodge members in their cities and towns.

In closing, it is necessary to explain that this book is not about slavery nor the advent of freed slaves or otherwise free black people; nor is it about the rise of Prince Hall Masonry, but obviously these racial realities figure substantially in the history of Virginia and the fraternal orders that prospered there during this specific period. Prince Hall Masonry is discussed for several pages. It is said to have existed in Virginia as early as 1845 in the form of Universal Lodge No. 1 in Alexandria, although the law clearly prohibited secret societies for black men.

This reviewer has been saying for years that some of the best books investigating Freemasonry have come from the labors of scholars outside the fraternity, and Ami Pflugrad-Jackisch’s very thoughtful analysis of antebellum Virginia is among the best even though Masonry is not its sole focus. The author has lectured for Masonic audiences in recent years, including the Scottish Rite (Northern Masonic Jurisdiction) New Perspectives on American Freemasonry and Fraternalism symposium in 2010 in Massachusetts, and the International Conference on the History of Freemasonry in 2011 in Virginia. I strongly encourage any or all of Virginia’s five lodges of Masonic research—particularly Civil War Lodge of Research No. 1865—to invite this professor to speak.
     

Saturday, May 26, 2012

‘Observing the Craft’

    
Retrieved recently from a dead PC is my review of Bro. Andrew Hammer’s terrific book Observing the Craft written for The Journal of the Masonic Society. I didnt know Hodapp already had written a review for the publication, so this review might as well have been lost in a hopelessly infected and disabled computer. But it was resurrected, with some other files, by a wizard earlier this spring, just in time to submit to Cory Sigler for his first issue of the new The New Jersey Freemason magazine, which arrived in the brethren’s mailboxes a week ago. I only had to dust it off, trim a few words, and click send.


Now, if I can get my thousands of JPGs off that computer, I’ll be a happy man.




Observing the Craft: The Pursuit of Excellence in Masonic Labour and Observance
By Andrew Hammer
Mindhive Books, 2010, 145pp.


Click here to order your copy.
Not to be confused with either Traditional Observance lodges or the Rite of Strict Observance, Andrew Hammer’s book has us cast our eyes to the East to observe his trestleboard for Masonic labors. Observing the Craft briefly and boldly reaches two key objectives: First, to show Freemasons that the rituals and symbols of the lodge impart all the Light Masonry intends, and secondly to convince the Mason that the lodge ought to be cherished, that it is worthy of his time and talents. Along the way, Hammer unflinchingly redefines Masonry’s numerous appendant, concordant, and affiliated fraternities as “distractions” that deprive lodges of the brethren’s attention; and he provides a simple formula for improving the lodge experience so that Masons can enjoy the excellence they expect and deserve. He gets that and much more done in only 145 pages, perhaps unsurprising for a Mason who shares the name of a tool made to deliver sudden, forceful impacts.

For context, it should be understood that Bro. Hammer is not a typical American Mason. A native of the United Kingdom (which explains his book’s British spelling), he is a Past Master of Alexandria-Washington Lodge No. 22, which meets inside the George Washington Masonic Memorial in Alexandria, Virginia. The ethos he helped bring to this historic lodge in the previous decade is summarized in a plain statement to prospective petitioners. I paraphrase: “The question is not ‘Can I become a Mason?’ There are many lodges in the area that will be glad to have you. The question is ‘Can I become a Mason in Alexandria-Washington Lodge?’” This is not arrogance, but it is a reason why his lodge was dubbed the Grand Lodge of Northern Virginia, a sobriquet bestowed unkindly by Virginia Masons who instead should have been taking note of A-W’s revival under the leadership of Hammer and his colleagues. In the revitalization of Masonic lodges taking place across the country in recent years, Hammer’s touch is felt thanks to his leadership in the Knights of the North think tank, The Masonic Society educational fraternity, other organized proponents of Masonic renaissance, and of course this book.

Observing the Craft is audacious in its phrasing, but its thinking is so fundamental as to be irrefutable. It is, after all, paraphrasing the teachings of the lodge. When Hammer challenges the flawed belief that more men equals a stronger fraternity, which leads to mass initiations, he says “The very essence of membership in the Craft is not about bringing people in, for whatever reason… the essence of membership in the Craft is that it must be sought.” He essentially is reminding us of the Entered Apprentice Charge, which urges us to be cautious in recommending a man to the lodge because it is the mysteries of Masonry that distinguish us from the rest of the community. And where that charge warns us against arguing with the ignorant that ridicule Masonry, Hammer insists “If we are to be consistent in that charge, then we must also not suffer ourselves to placate prying eyes or the mindless paranoia of philistines.” Not a motto for Square and Compass Day.

Addressing charity, the author describes it as “the perfection of every virtue,” something with which we all can agree, but he is fearless in making the distinction, long forgotten in Masonry, that “Masonic charity is not material benevolence. Rather, it is the spiritual and philosophical awakening which motivates it.” Does not the lecture of the First Degree instruct us, on the subject of Relief, in acts of emotional and psychological kindness?

The author also writes at length on tangible aspects of lodge life, namely dining, dress, and ritual. Of the first item, Hammer takes us to the Festive Board, a stylized Masonic meal (not to be confused with the Table Lodge) that follows the tiled meeting, but continues the decorum of that meeting. “The guiding idea is that the food should be of the same quality one would find in any fine restaurant, and it should be presented and served in a way that conveys dignity even if served on paper plates.” In ambiance, the Festive Board is a place of good cheer, where the brethren may speak candidly, offer toasts, and basically balance the solemnity of the lodge meeting with the joy of fellowship.

As regards dress, Hammer explains that attire is nothing less than a Mason’s “physical manifestation of his effort to bring his mind and soul to a state of excellence.” The specifics are best left to the lodge, but “No one should dress differently for lodge than they would to attend their house of worship or take part in any other important event in their lives.”

On ritual, it is “perhaps the single most important aspect of observing the Craft” and “what transforms a room into a lodge, the men in that room into Masons, and the profane into the sublime.” It goes without saying, so Hammer gently reminds that the performance of our rituals to the highest levels of proficiency is the primary goal, but his larger point concerns ways to “excite the curiosity of all observant Masons.” Urging us all to always work within the guidelines of our respective jurisdictions, the author suggests the following:

  • Confer the degree on one man only so he makes an individual journey, and is the center of the lodge’s attention.

  • Employ music to “elevate the assembly of minds gathered together” and to accentuate different aspects of ritual work at specific times. Conversely, use silence to remove all distractions from the sense of hearing. Obviously, this means no chatting on the sidelines, but also much more for the benefit of everyone’s state of mind.

  • To further assist the focusing of the mind, light and darkness must be properly managed. “Darkness, like silence, concentrates the mind by removing all other distractions” and the light revealed to the candidate when the hoodwink is removed should be only “a simple flame,” so no other “competing visual images” enter his mind. That’s the moving flame of the candle, mind you, and not the kitschy “Masonic light bulb.”

  • Appealing to our sense of smell, Hammer praises incense. The sense of touch can be addressed through what is called the Chain of Union, the interlocking of arms and clasping of hands to achieve “psychological and physical union” around the entire lodge room.

Clearly, to Andrew Hammer, Freemasonry is a verb. To observe the Craft is to take up the Working Tools and thoughtfully go about our labors in self-improvement, but doing so harmoniously together. It’s all explained in our rituals, lectures, charges, and other orations. The trick is to not be content with merely memorizing and reciting all that inspiring literature, and instead to animate it by doing what it advises. In his concluding paragraphs, Hammer explains “This book was written in an attempt to call the Craft from refreshment to labour. That labour involves confronting our fear with dignity; it involves standing up for the ideas of free thought and free association in the face of those who would demand we eviscerate our mysteries before their altars of cloying superficiality; it involves respecting ourselves enough to say that we must not be afraid to reach for more light within ourselves, that light of the contemplative spirit within each of us that cannot be meted out to curious bystanders just because they want to see it.”

It is the blueprint – if you will, the designs upon the trestleboard – for a successful lodge of skilled craftsmen. How many of us will heed the sound of the gavel?
    

Friday, May 11, 2012

‘Have you heard the good news?’


     
Like I mentioned in a post somewhere below, there are some good things happening in New Jersey Freemasonry these days, some beginning at the top, but others rising from the grass roots.

Every year, our grand lodge hosts what it calls a leadership conference at the Elizabethtown campus of the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania. I don’t know what goes on there – when I used to bother asking about it, brethren either would just stare at their shoes or start gushing wildly about brotherhood, and frankly I don’t perceive a statewide improvement in leadership – so I can’t describe it to you in any detail, but it is several days of classroom-type instruction and break-out sessions, and the like. This year it will take place at the end of October.

Anyway, and don’t ask me how this has come to be, but Cliff Porter will be the guest lecturer this year!

W. Bro. Cliff is a Past Master of Enlightenment Lodge No. 198 in Colorado. He is the author of several books: The Secret Psychology of Freemasonry and Masonic Baptism among them. In addition, he is one of the guiding lights behind the Sanctum Sanctorum Education Foundation, and Living Stones Magazine.

Undoubtedly one of the sharpest thinkers on the Masonic scene today, and I’m sure he’ll be great at the leadership conference.

In other good news, and this one strikes close to home because it concerns publishing, is the complete change of direction given to New Jersey Freemason magazine, the official periodical of the Grand Lodge of New Jersey. When I was a young Master Mason, this publication was produced on newsprint, in tabloid shape if I recall correctly. Through the foresight and toil of the editors then, it made the transition to magazine format on glossy paper about 10 or 12 years ago. The problem through all that time to the present has been the content of the magazine, which ran the gamut from uninspired to unnecessary. Actually it has been very typical of grand lodge magazines: big on posed “grip & grin” photos, charity work, necrology, and bureaucratic odds and ends, but bereft of anything Masonic. I guess they did the best they could, but now the magazine is under the direction of W. Bro. Cory Sigler, editor and publisher of The Working Tools e-zine. Cory reached out to New Jersey Lodge of Masonic Research and Education No. 1786 to tap into its talent, and otherwise has made a strong effort to build a staff of writers to provide solid Masonic education pieces, current events reportage, and other content that thinking Masons actually will want to read. I haven’t seen the finished product yet, but it’s in the mail somewhere.

The first printed issue of The Working Tools.
In addition, let me congratulate Cory on his first hard copy publication of The Working Tools. After 51 issues over the course of six years, he has just gone to press with an actual magazine magazine. (Cory, forgive me, but except for your first issue, I’ve never really read The Working Tools before. I can’t read magazines on-line. I need the physical book in my hands. It catches my cigar ash, you see.)

And last but not least in the Good News Department is the launch of a book club in northern New Jersey. The brethren of the Second Masonic District, chiefly at Fidelity Lodge, but also drawing Masons from other lodges, recognized a need to discuss real ideas in Freemasonry, and thus this book club and discussion group.

You know they mean business and are hungry for reform when the first text they choose is Laudable Pursuit, the biggest plum among the fruits of the labors of the Knights of the North. Truth be told, it mainly is the work of Chris Hodapp, but it was published anonymously at the time (around 2005) for reasons I hope we’ve all forgotten by now.

I found out about the book club’s first meeting by accident, but then was contacted by the organizers. I said sure I’ll come! I thought they’d get a kick out of having a KOTN alum present, and I did get a few minutes to speak and share some inside baseball.

For better or worse, the topics confronted by LP stimulated the group to the extent that conversation was hard to organize, and we realized a second meeting to discuss LP was necessary. I missed that one. But what was really cool was the group itself: about 30 Masons, varying from a newly raised Master Mason to the District Deputy Grand Master.



The group will meet next on Monday the 21st at Nutley Lodge No. 25, and another KOTN alum will be there: none other than Hodapp himself, who will be in New Jersey for a few days to co-star in our 2012 Scottish Rite Symposium, with Bob Davis and Brent Morris. Click here for info on that! Thanks to the size of the auditorium, we actually have some seats remaining. Only $50 per person, which covers breakfast, lunch, and souvenirs.



There are other good things in the works here, and I look forward to telling you about them when the time is right or as they develop.