‘Upcoming Events in Freemasonry’

     
I can’t get to any of these, but there’s no reason why you shouldn’t.


Saturday, July 19 – A big day in New York Capitular Masonry indeed. At 9:30 a.m. a short ceremony in front of the RAM Medical Research wing on the Utica Campus will honor ME Edmund ‘Ted’ Harrison, the first General Grand High Priest from New York State in more than 50 years, by presenting a $100,000 check from the RAM Medical Research Foundation. The patio before the building will be dedicated to Ted. All are invited to attend this open ceremony. Royal Arch Masons may wear red jackets.


July 25-27 – A grand event held annually by the Nobles of Mecca Shrine in New York City: Florence Weekend. Actually it used to be Florence Day, but Mecca exhibits great panache and gung ho in its social doings. Friday night, starting at six, fraternal festivities at The Monarch Lounge on West 35th Street in Manhattan. Bring your own cigars. Saturday, the Yankee-Blue Jays game (sold out). Sunday is the day everyone gathers at Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn at 12:30 to pay respects at the final resting place of Billy Florence, co-founder of the Ancient Arabic Order of Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. Click here to get a look at what this is like.

But that’s not all! After the visit to the gravesite, all are invited to the Annual Mecca Barbecue at the Bushwick Country Club (618 Grand Street), which you do not want to miss.


Monday, August 4 – Maryland Masonic Research Society to host its Annual Festive Board. To feature speakers S. Brent Morris and Arturo de Hoyos(!) on “The First Two Exposures of the High Degrees of Masonry.” Books for sale and signing after the program.

August 15-17 – The Masonic Restoration Foundation invites Master Masons to its Fifth Annual Symposium at the Cincinnati Masonic Center. Festive Board, workshops, lectures, a “Scotch Harmony,” and other attractions await. Registration: $100 per person. Click here to sign up.


Saturday, September 13 – A singular occurrence, as The Masonic Society and the Philalethes Society jointly sponsor a symposium at the Scottish Rite Valley of Chicago, located in Bloomingdale, Illinois. Registration costs only $15. Attendance is capped at 100, so click here to book your seat.

Speakers: Alton Roundtree, editor of The Phylaxis; Shawn Eyer, editor of The Philalethes; Steven Harrison, editor of The Missouri Freemason; and Mark Robbins, Education Officer for the Grand Lodge of Minnesota. Andrew Hammer, author of Observing the Craft, will be the keynote speaker at the banquet, a separate event with a $35 dining fee.


Tuesday, September 16 – Second District Masonic Book Club to discuss A Traditional Observance Lodge by Cliff Porter. Dinner at 6:30. At Fidelity Lodge No. 113, 99 South Maple Avenue in Ridgewood, New Jersey.

Saturday, September 20 – The First Masonic Educational Symposium hosted by Wilmington Lodge No. 804 in New Wilmington, Pennsylvania. Four speakers lined up: Charles M. Harper, Sr., author of Freemasonry in Black and White; Juan Sepulveda, of The Winding Stairs podcast; Adam T. Osman, author of Earning Freemasonry; and Shawn M. Gorley, author of Freemasonry Defined.

Open to Apprentices and Fellows. Cost: only $30 per person, in advance only, which covers breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Only 100 seats are available. For information, contact Bro. Gorley at shawn(at)drivenbylight(dot)net

September 25-30 – Joint Triennial Session of both the General Grand Chapter of Royal Arch Masons International and the General Grand Council of Cryptic Masons International at Buffalo, New York. Click here for the registration info.

Saturday, October 11 – New Jersey Lodge of Masonic Research and Education No. 1786 to meet at 10 a.m. in the Haddonfield Masonic Temple in Haddonfield, New Jersey. Agenda TBA.

Steve Burkle

Saturday, October 18 – Pennsylvania Academy of Masonic Knowledge to host its Fall Session. Professor David G. Hackett will speak on topics from his book That Religion in Which All Men Agree: Freemasonry in American Culture. Steve Burkle will speak on “Early Adoption of Paracelsus’ Alchemical Catechism by the Craft.” Steve knows his alchemy, so check it out.

It’s a full-day affair, beginning at 8:30 a.m. in the Masonic Cultural Center on the Elizabethtown campus. No charge, but advance registration is required; do so by e-mailing to amksecretary(at)pagrandlodge(dot)org, including name, address, lodge name and number.


October 23-25 – The Masonic Library and Museum Association will hold its Annual Meeting at the Trenton Masonic Temple in Trenton, New Jersey. Here is all the information.
     

‘Florence Day’

    

Some gravesites become secular shrines for modern pilgrims. (Think Elvis Presley.) Others are the sites of mysterious annual traditions. (The three roses and half-consumed bottle of cognac left for Edgar Allan Poe, for example.) At the final resting place of William J. “Billy” Florence, the nobles of Mecca Shrine Temple initiated a modest commemoration of the life of the co-founder of the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. July 25 was that celebration, the third annual Founders Day (on the Sunday closest to the Florence’s birthday), in the historic Green-Wood Cemetery in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

In 2008, Noble Isaac Moore, who now is Outer Guard of Mecca Shrine in New York City, with then Potentate Mike Quigley, Chief Rabban Sanford Gottesman, and Noble Jim Reichman conceived the event out their fraternal regard for their famous founder, and their unshakable commitment to relishing a day of eating, drinking, and smoking. There was a desire on the part of other Shriners to dress up the event Sunday and make it more officious, but Isaac & Co. are having none of that, and if you know anything about Billy Florence and the creation of the Shriners, you’ll agree with them.

Outside of Masonry, Florence is remembered as a famous actor, which is notable considering the only other actor of that era anyone knows is infamous for murdering the president of the United States. Florence and Walter Fleming were Freemasons who had become frustrated with the absence of an outlet for merriment in Freemasonry. Of course this was the Victorian age, not too long after Freemasonry had left the taverns for its own dedicated temples, having emerged chastened from the devastation wrought by the Morgan scandal. It was a time when grand lodges banned alcohol from its lodges, and when the lectures of the degrees would be transformed from fraternally bonding group interactions to the monologues we know today. Blue Lodge Masonry was solemn and sober, and its charitable impulses were channeled outward to show everybody that Masons were good guys.

Perhaps the most comprehensive history of the Shrine is the book “Parade to Glory” by Fred Van Deventer. It doesn’t appear to be a very candid history – cleaned up for an innocent readership – but it may be the only book on the subject.

Anyway, the weather last Sunday was perfect for an outdoor event. About two dozen Shriners, their ladies, and other Masons like myself were in attendance. Michael G. Severe, Deputy Imperial Potentate, made the trip all the way from his home in Colorado!

The commemoration consisted of readings from Scripture, words of appreciation expressed by Potentate Ted Jacobsen, Severe, High Priest & Prophet Reichman, Oriental Guide Avery Toledo, and others. Past Potentate Gottesman read aloud the lengthy inscription on the bronze tablet in front of Florence’s impressive monument. It is William Winter’s eulogy of Florence:

By Virtue cherished, by Affection mourned

By Honor hallowed and by Fame adorned

Here Florence sleeps, and o’er his sacred rest

Each word is tender and each thought is blest.

Long, for his loss, shall pensive Memory show,

Through Humor’s mask, the visage of her woe

Dale breathe a darkness that no sun dispels,

And Night be full of whispers and farewells;

While patient Kindness shadow-like and dim

Droops in its loneliness, bereft of him

Feels its sad doom and sure decadence high

For how should kindness live, when he could die!

The eager heart, that felt for every grief;

The bounteous hand, that loved to give relief

The honest smile, that blest where’er it lit

The dew of pathos and the sheen of wit:

The sweet, blue eyes, the voice of melting tone

That made all hearts as gentle as his own;

The actor’s charm, supreme in royal thrall

That ranged through every field and shone in all.

For these must Sorrow make perpetual moan

Bereaved, benighted, hopeless and alone

Ah, no! for Nature does not act amiss

And Heaven were lonely but for souls like this.

But about the eating, drinking, and smoking: Most of us adjourned to the Bushwick Country Club, an exclusive resort on Grand Street. Beers, ribs, and oysters, with cigars for some, were enjoyed with great pleasure. A sudden rain kept everyone off the golf course (miniature), but there was plenty else to do.

With some time to pass between the memorial ceremony and lunch at the Country Club, I remained inside the Green-Wood Cemetery to look for Masonic headstones and other notable sights. To wit:

I don’t know who Capt. C.A. Mathisen was, but he must have taken his Freemasonry very seriously. In addition to the Square and Compasses on the front of his mausoleum, there are leaded stained glass windows showing other Masonic symbols on all sides.

Not every Mason’s gravesite was so grand. Here are some more “normal” headstones, but keep scrolling to the end for a special sight.

The name on the mausoleum reads Van Ness Parsons. No indication of a Masonic affiliation, but one would think a man entombed inside this pyramid surely was a Rosicrucian of some kind! Although some websites say he was an Egyptologist, but without saying anything more certain.

Of course that is a sphinx on the right. Flanking the entrance is Jesus as an adult, holding a lamb; and Mary holding the infant Jesus.

I do not know what type of stone this is, but the sphinx is eroding.

A winged solar disk, above the entrance of the pyramid.

    

    

Not far from the main entrance of the cemetery is this sort of Tree of Life mural on the side of a building on 18th Street at Fifth Avenue in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.