‘Maryland puts The Grand back in Grand Lodge’

    

Baltimore Business Journal

The Grand Lodge of Maryland has acquired the building that originally was the brethren’s longtime headquarters, according to local media.

Baltimore Business Journal reported yesterday that the Grand Lodge purchased The Grand, which “has struggled with revolving ownership and financial woes in recent years.”

It was built by the Grand Lodge in 1866, but was sold in 1998 to a hotelier. After years of renovations, it reopened as a luxurious banquet hall and events venue named the Tremont Grand. Name changes ensued until it became The Grand in 2015. Maybe you’ve seen it as an on location site in episodes of House of Cards, Veep, and others.

The Grand

Financial difficulty characterized the building’s existence from the start. It was on Tuesday, November 20, 1866 when the Grand Lodge laid its cornerstone. The 1887 book of proceedings notes in reflection:

At the May Communication 1864, Grand Master Coates recommended that preliminary steps be taken looking to the inauguration of the enterprise. It was resolved to issue stock to the extent of $200,000 and that as soon as the subscriptions thereto amounted to $50,000, the Grand Charity Fund should be invested in the same security. A Building Committee was appointed consisting of [Grand Master] John Coates, Francis Burns, John S. Berry, Charles Webb, William Wilson, Jr., George J. Kennard, and James Logue. Bro. Edmund G. Lind was subsequently selected as Architect.

In November 1865, the Committee reported the purchase of the site of the present Temple on North Charles Street, and in May following, additional ground was bought to enlarge the lot. On the 20th November, 1866, the Grand Lodge laid the cornerstone of the New Temple with imposing ceremonies. The procession was immense, including Lodges, Chapters, and Commanderies at home and from various other States. The President of the United States, Bro. Andrew Johnson, Past Grand Master of Tennessee, with his Secretary, Bro. Robert Johnson, escorted by Governor Swann and his uniformed Staff, joined the procession at the Governor's residence on Franklin Street and marched with the Grand Master his suite through the open lines to the site of the new Building.

Hymns composed for the occasion by Rev. Andrew Longacre and Hon. Brantz Mayer were sung by a choir of two hundred voices, accompanied by an orchestra, under the supervision of Bro. Robert J. Kerr. Rev. R.W. McMurdy of New York, Grand Prelate of the Grand Encampment of the United States, acted as Grand Chaplain.

Our distinguished and now venerable Brother, John H.B. Latrobe, delivered an able and eloquent oration, concluding with the following beautiful peroration: “Whether Freemasonry may go back to the Mithratic caves, Egyptian or Grecian temples, to Roman Collegia, to the House of the Lord at Jerusalem in Moriah—to the preceptories of the Templars—to the Crusades—to the charter of Athelstan—or the Lodge of Kilwinning—is, after all, but of little moment. Its principles can alone be relied on to maintain our time honored Order in its purity. They inculcate charity to all mankind—a charity without stint—a brotherhood without boundaries—religion without sectarianism— patriotism without party—a union, not of hands only, but of hearts—a union not limited to persons, but embracing states and nations and all this accompanied by the profoundest recognition of man’s dependence upon Him, whose All Seeing Eye is our emblem, who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out the Earth with a span, and comprehended the dust of the Earth in a balance and weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance….”

The building of the new Temple had meanwhile progressed amid rejoicing and congratulation and at the May Communication 1869, Grand Master Coates, Chairman of the Building Committee, reported that the Temple was completed and ready for occupancy. But now came “the tug of war.” It had not been paid for...

All efforts were now directed towards raising the means to meet the pressing claims. Taxation upon the Subordinate Lodges was necessarily resorted to, and in the emergency a host of critics arose to find fault with the plan of building and even the policy of erecting the structure at all. Unfortunately the main hall, which had been relied upon as a source of large revenue from rentals, proved deficient in its most important requirement: acoustics.

Murmurings of discontent, complaints, and even denunciations, became the order of the day, and many brethren who could doubtless have built a different Temple, felt and expressed confidence that they could have built a better one. Meanwhile the creditors, not content with urging the payment of their claims by pacific methods, had resorted to legal process and the sale of the Temple to satisfy its liens was only delayed by the struggle for priority among the various claimants. It happened at this critical juncture in the affairs of the Grand Lodge, as it always does in meritorious cases in human affairs, that men were found to meet the emergency. At the November Communication 1780, Brother John H.B. Latrobe, who had delivered the Oration at the laying of the cornerstone of the building, was elected Grand Master and at once called a halt in the rapid march towards financial disgrace.

Their records show the costs of acquiring the land (first one lot, then a second), and the construction, furnishing, decorating, etc. of the new headquarters approached $500,000—legitimately a shocking sum for a fraternal order. In his History of Freemasonry in Maryland (Vol. 4), author Edward Thomas Schultz writes:

...and in consequence, the Grand Lodge became greatly embarrassed financially. Many and great complaints were heard and censures expressed by the brethren against the plan and cost of the building. While there is no doubt the building cost too much, and was in some respects not constructed to meet fully the requirements of the fraternity, it is not certain that another committee under the circumstances then existing, would have done better. It was perhaps unfortunate that the building had not been commenced in 1859, when the subject was first agitated and when building materials and labor were very low, whereas in the first few years after the war materials and labor were higher than perhaps ever known in Baltimore before or since.

At Grand Lodge’s semi-annual communication on May 10, 1869, Grand Master John Coates informed the brethren that he believed a public celebration of dedicating and opening the building should be avoided, saying:

The certainty that in a few days, our subordinate Lodges and other Masonic bodies will occupy the several rooms prepared for their use, renders it necessary that provision should be made for the dedication of our New Temple. This has been to me a matter of serious consideration, in view of the great necessity for money to pay off the debts yet due upon the Temple, and my desire as well as that of the Craft generally, to celebrate the completion of this great enterprise, in such a manner as would be creditable to the Fraternity of Maryland. After due reflection and a consultation with the Grand Officers and other prominent Masons, we have deemed it most wise and prudent to perform the ceremony of Dedication during the session of the Grand Lodge, without any public demonstration, involving as it would, a heavy expenditure of money. The very great responsibility we have assumed in building this Temple, involving us in heavy obligations, and upon the faithful discharge of which our honor and very existence depends, demands of us the husbanding of every dollar of our means, and the strictest economy in the management of our finances. There is yet required to pay off the remaining floating debt upon the Temple, about forty thousand dollars, which the Building Committee are endeavoring to secure. A heavy tax has been laid upon our city Lodges to meet the expenses incurred in furnishing the various rooms prepared for their use, which has exhausted all the funds in their possession. Under these circumstances we are wholly unable to make such a public demonstration as would be creditable to us, and would not detract from the reputation we have already established by that most grand and imposing display made on the occasion of laying the cornerstone.

Joanna Campbell Rocky 98.5

Joanna Campbell Rocky 98.5

Joanna Campbell Rocky 98.5

Joanna Campbell Rocky 98.5

I hope a suitable celebration will mark the return of Freemasonry to the historic site. Congratulations, brethren!