‘A grand evening’

    

Wednesday night was the occasion of the public apron re-presentation for both RW J. Scott Nagel, District Deputy Grand Master of the First Manhattan District, and RW Jason Sheridan, Grand Director of Ceremonies, at Masonic Hall. St. John’s Lodge No. 1 specifically. Scores of guests, dozens of dignitaries, more than several speeches, and the main event itself made for a dizzyingly eventful evening.

Opening the historic George Washington Inaugural Bible before the start
of the public ceremony.

Posting the colors.

Jason, left, accepts his Commission from Deputy Grand Master Bill Thomas.

Scott, flanked by his wife and Grand Master James Sullivan,
accepts his Commission.

VW Piers Vaughan, Worshipful Master of St. John's,
presented Jason his jewel of office.

The Solomonic Chair of St. John's No. 1, AYM.

The gavel.

‘The KJV at A-P’

    
This just in:

Bro. Oscar Alleyne will speak at Atlas-Pythagoras Lodge tonight! Topic: the frontispiece of the first edition of the King James Bible from a Masonic perspective.

If you are not familiar with this famously symbolic page of early publishing, here it is:

But seriously, this should be an excellent presentation. If you want to prime your appetite a bit in anticipation, click here for some Magpie coverage of the KJV’s quadricentennial celebration.

    

‘Keep the ClockWorks ticking’

    
The Cosmic Bicycle Theatre and The ClockWorks Puppetry Studios is the acclaimed venue of wondrous and spectacular sights and sounds that has enchanted audiences from Boston to Brooklyn for nearly a quarter of a century. It entertains children, enlightens adults, and even has a production titled The Alchemical Work! Our Masonic Brother Jonathan Cross, a.k.a. Jonny ClockWorks, is the creator and, uh, I shall say, master of it all.

And, yes, this is the same theater that partnered with Norah Jones a few months ago, setting experimental puppetry to the inspired songs of her latest album Little Broken Hearts. The collaboration, titled Theatre of Little Broken Hearts, was so successful as an integral attraction in the launch of the record, that a four-week run (of six shows per week) was produced back in Brooklyn over the summer.

The following is an appeal from Jonny Clockworks:


Dear Friends of The ClockWorks,

Thanks to the fantastic turn-out at the “Save The ClockWorks” edition of our Das WunderKammer - Puppet Kabarett, as well as generous donations from many of you, we have raised two-thirds of the funding needed, but we are still woefully short of our goal.

We still need a minimum of $4,000 to remain open past the end of this month. We have only until Monday, October 22 to raise these necessary funds. The sooner we make this goal, the sooner we can layout the plans of the rest of our season. Instead, we are hedging our bets, and figuring out how we could quickly save the art and equipment from our current home.

WE NEED YOUR HELP! Please consider making a donation TODAY. We have set up a PayPal account to receive your generous donations.

I promise to continue the fight, but I cannot do it alone. We are praying that we can resolve this quickly with your assistance in time to celebrate another Halloween at The ClockWorks. Thank you for your belief and support.

Sincerely Yours,

Jonathan Edward Cross
a.k.a. Jonny ClockWorks
     

‘From East to West...someday’

  
I cannot promise I’ll ever be able to visit, but Western New York Lodge of Research No. 9007 is at labor in the Buffalo area, and in fact will celebrate its 30th anniversary on Saturday.

The brethren will salute the lodge’s founders and Past Masters at the Cheektowaga Masonic Center at 10 a.m. This tiled meeting will be followed by lunch at a local restaurant. All Master Masons are welcome.

Cheektowaga Masonic Center is located at 97 Lucid Drive in Buffalo.

For more information about the lodge, please contact Bro. Mark Robson at markrobson(at)yahoo.com
  

‘At home and on the road’

     

The American Lodge of Research will meet on Monday the 29th at Masonic Hall. Not our usual French Ionic Room, but the Colonial Room this time. The usual 8 p.m. Opening, but please join the brethren at six for a “no host” meal at Sagaponack, on 24th near Fifth Avenue. The paper to be presented this evening will be Bro. Conor Moran’s “Freemasonry and the Holocaust.”

And next month, on Saturday the 10th, the lodge will take it on the road to Liverpool, New York. That’s Lee Miller country. Way up north. Beatles’ hometown, etc., etc. This Special Communication will be convened at Masonic Hall, located at 608 Oswego Street for an Upstate Festive Board of Research! The paper to be presented will be the Worshipful Master’s “A Brief History of Freemasonry in India.” The cost per person will be $15.

(The Magpie Mason will be absent from this one. The 10th is a big Scottish Rite day in New Jersey, and I will be engaged there.)

     

‘Back to the Bowery’

  

Bust of Tompkins
at the church

Freemasonry is headed back to the Bowery this weekend.

Beginning the Scottish Rite Northern Masonic Jurisdiction’s celebration of its bicentenary, the New York Council of Deliberation will re-dedicate the gravesite of Daniel D. Tompkins, the first Sovereign Grand Commander of the NMJ, on Saturday morning.

Click here for information about the site and a previous celebration of Tompkins.

The gravesite is located at St. Mark’s Church-in-the-Bowery, at 131 East 10th Street, at Second Avenue. The brethren will gather there at 11 a.m.

Any questions should be directed to Event Chairman Moises Gomez at gomez1rego(at)aol.com
  

‘Vacation’

  
If you define a vacation as the act of taking off several days (at least) from work, traveling a notable distance – and one outside your usual orbit – and settling in at one location (at least) for recreation and nothing but, then last week I took my first vacation since the summer of 1994. (Yeah. I know that’s 18 years.)

Provincetown, Massachusetts was my family’s vacation spot every August in the 1970s when I was a child, and it was there I returned for 72 hours of sightseeing, seafood dining, beer tasting, and cigar smoking. The sightseeing included visiting several places of Masonic interest right in the middle of town.

The first stop was obvious: Masonic Place, the address of King Hiram’s Lodge, chartered in 1795 by none other than Paul Revere, Grand Master.

In Provincetown, street signs can be found wherever.

Had I arrived a day earlier, I could have visited the lodge.

Every square foot on Commercial Street is valuable... and occupied. Retail shops, art galleries, inns, restaurants, and other entities are crammed into every possible lot, separated by a network of alleys, driveways, byways, snickelways, and paths. As you can see, King Hiram Lodge has retail space in its frontage, and there is a club in the rear. This Buddhist monk appeared by pure happenstance.

Constructed in the first decade of the 20th century, the Pilgrim Memorial Monument towers over Provincetown from its hilltop perch. Its construction began with a Masonic cornerstone-laying ceremony in 1907, and ended with a Masonic consecration in 1910.

The Monument stands 252 feet. On the way up, you will see dozens of markers placed by sponsoring societies, municipalities, and others who made construction of the landmark possible. Here is that of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts.

Also on the grounds of the Monument is the Provincetown Museum. Among the artifacts on display are ephemera concerning Masonry’s role in bringing the Monument to fruition. Here is the printed program for the cornerstone-laying ceremony of August 20, 1907.

A time capsule was enclosed in the Monument construction. Among its contents is a book of Grand Lodge proceedings from 1907.

An outdoor marker on the grounds of the Monument.

As above, so below.

While surveying the scenery from the top of the Monument, I spotted a cemetery. Visiting Provincetown Cemetery, I did not find any grave markers from the 17th or 18th centuries, as I had hoped, but I certainly did come across a number of Masonic headstones, and some of these were notable.

Bro. McIntosh had the Keystone of Mark Masonry
engraved into his headstone.

Bro. Francis P. Smith has a monument illustrated with the Beehive, the Square and Compasses, and the three-link chain of Odd Fellowship. The Odd Fellows of Marine Lodge No. 96 were an important force in the social and philanthropic lives of Provincetown.

Close-up of the emblems.

Bro. Joshua P. Atkins has the S&C inside the Mark Master Keystone.

I do not know if Capt. Ira B. Atkins was a relation
or only a Masonic brother.

This one could not escape notice.

Bro. Reuben Ryder also has the links of Odd Fellowship with his S&C.

I photographed other stones, and there were others still that I did not stop to shoot, but you get the idea.

I left town on Friday morning, taking the scenic route for a while, and when passing through Sandwich, I happened across Dewitt Clinton Lodge, instituted in 1885.

The lodge building was a church constructed in 1847.

The brethren will host an open house on October 20.
The lodge is located at 175 Main Street.

I cannot help but wonder how a street earns the name
Good Templar Place, but there it is in Provincetown.

    

‘Coming to Mariners’

    

This just in:

RW Bro. Ben Hoff, Past Master of New Jersey Lodge of Masonic Research and Education No. 1786 and Highland Park Lodge No. 240, will appear at the podium of historic Mariners Lodge No. 67 in New York City next February.

I know, I know. It’s a long way off, but do mark your calendar for Wednesday, February 13, 2013. Mariners meets in Masonic Hall (71 W. 23rd Street in Manhattan), inside the Doric Room on the eighth floor.

Ben, a Past Grand Historian of the Grand Lodge of New Jersey, is well known about the apartments of the Temple here for his research into the origins and evolution of Craft lodge rituals. I don’t know what his topic for Mariners will be, but I highly recommend attending. It is important to hear a common sense approach containing factual information about Masonic rituals to help you discern reality and history from the fantasy and wishful thinking found in too many contemporary books and papers. Ben draws straight from the source materials – the ritual exposures, monitors, jurisprudence, and other texts – in his skillful investigations into how the degrees and ceremonies we employ today really came to be. Sometimes he travels with a few of these 18th and 19th century treasures from his library for the brethren to see.

No doubt I will post reminders about this as the date nears and more information (dinner, etc.) becomes available, but record the date in your smartphone or whatever.
     

‘Harry Potter lectures’

     
You can count on the Anthroposophical Society to host all kinds of interesting programs, none of them directly involving Freemasonry, but many geared to gratify the curiosity and hunger of the Masonic mind.

So naturally I missed the one I hoped to see Saturday.

It was the first in a four-part lecture series courtesy of Eugene Schwartz, a Waldorf educator, on “Harry Potter and the Secret Brotherhoods.”

From the publicity:

Is there really anything more to be said about the Harry Potter series? The awe-inspiring sales figures of the books (almost 500 million copies) and the record-breaking grosses of the movies ($7.7 billion) are pointed to as evidence of spiritual vacuity, and the fact that they were written as children’s books supposedly defines the limits of their author’s vision. Eugene Schwartz contends that there is a great deal more to be said about Rowling’s seven volumes, especially if they are read as bold forays into the shadowy domains of the “secret brotherhoods.” Eugene will draw us into the surprisingly profound world of children’s books and movies and explore the “open secret” of contemporary spiritual visionaries.

No familiarity with any of the Harry Potter books is necessary. Let us know in advance that you are going to attend any one (or all) of the lectures and Eugene will send you plot summaries.

Lecture 1: As a backdrop to our Harry Potter explorations, we will look at some children’s classics of the 20th century: J.R.R. Tolkien’s Ring trilogy, C.S. Lewis’ Narnia series, and (the anthroposophist) Michael Ende’s The Neverending Story.

Future lecture dates:

Jan. 26, 2013: Harry Potter, Volumes 1, 2, and 3;

April 6, 2013: Volumes 4, 5, and 6; and

May 11, 2013: Volume 7.

Click here to visit Anthroposophy NYC, and scroll down through the calendar. Check out the programs on Sacred Geometry, and other interesting subjects.
     

‘Mark Tabbert in Morristown’

     

Northern New Jersey Chapter of Rose Croix will host its next meeting in Morristown on Tuesday, November 13, when Most Wise Master Moises I. Gomez welcomes Ill. Mark A. Tabbert, 33° to the podium as our honored guest speaker.

Mark A. Tabbert

We’ll start out at Cincinnati Lodge No. 3 for a catered meal before heading around the corner to the historic Ford Mansion for Mark’s talk on the Masonic life and times of George Washington. As you know, Mark is the Director of Collections at the George Washington Masonic Memorial in Virginia, as well as the author of several thoughtful books on Freemasonry that you should have read by now.

This meeting commemorates the 260th anniversary of the Masonic raising of a young man named George Washington. Cincinnati Lodge is named for the Society of the Cincinnati, America’s oldest private society devoted to patriotic values. Founded in 1783 by American and French military officers of the American Revolution, it lives on today through its hereditary membership as a historical and educational foundation in the public service. The Ford Mansion is a mid-18th century residence that served as Gen. George Washington’s headquarters during the storied winter of 1779-80. It now is part of the National Parks Service.

So you see the theme here.

The program at Ford Mansion is open to Master Masons. Leave me a note (not for publication) with your e-mail address in the comments section if you want to attend, and I’ll get back to you.

     

‘Hammer strikes’

     
Bro. Andrew Hammer is keeping busy this fall. Andrew is the author of Observing the Craft, a book I consider to be one of the most important writings on lodge life to be published in ages. If you are the Mason who hasn’t read it yet, click here, and order your copy. My review appears here.

Anyway, here are three dates I should bring to your attention.

On Thursday, October 11, Andrew will speak at his own lodge, historic Alexandria-Washington No. 22, which meets inside the George Washington Masonic Memorial in Alexandria, Virginia.

His topic will be “What Came Ye Here To Do: The Transformation of American Masonry,” in which Andrew will present “some thoughts on purpose and focus in our Masonic endeavors, and report on the exciting developments now taking place in the Craft throughout the nation.”

I’d say few are as qualified to speak on that subject today. Get there if you can, but you must make dinner reservations by e-mailing the Senior Steward at reservations(at)aw22.org now.

On Saturday, October 27, Andrew will speak at the Pennsylvania Academy of Masonic Knowledge in Elizabethtown. As always, the Academy will meet in the Deike Auditorium of the Freemasons Cultural Center at the Masonic Village. Registration will open at 8:30 a.m., and the program will start at 9:30 a.m. Lunch will be served at noon, and the program will be completed by 3 p.m. Dress code for this meeting is coat and tie. All Masons are welcome to attend, but please contact Bro. Shawn Dignazio at dignazio(at)yahoo.com no later than October 21.

Andrew will be sharing the podium with Bro. Alton G. Roundtree, Past Master of Redemption Lodge No. 24 PHA in Washington, DC. He is co-author, with Bro. Paul Bessel, of Out of the Shadows: The Emergence of Prince Hall Freemasonry in America.

On Monday, November 19, Bro. Andrew will return to New Jersey, this time to speak at Nutley Lodge No. 25 in Nutley. (This will be the only one that I’ll be able to attend. Hope to see you there.)

     

‘Apron presentations’

    
I intended to post this weeks ago, while there still was time for dinner reservations, but here is the good news anyway.

RW John Walker Robinson and RW Jason Sheridan are the kind of Masons you like to see in Grand Lodge office. Both are important to the 21st century revival of Craft Masonry in New York City, and with many more years of labor ahead of them, things will improve further.  (I look forward to getting to know RW Bro. Nagel.)

It is a classy tradition in the Grand Lodge of New York, that of presenting (or re-presenting) the grand rank apron to the staff officer in his mother lodge. These events are pretty amazing, with testimonials from longtime brethren, and the presence of so many relatives and friends. I regret not being able to attend tomorrow night, but I hope to be there on the 17th.

‘Traubenfest next Sunday’

    

And after Grand Master’s Day, don’t forget Traubenfest, just around the corner at German Masonic Park!

     

     

‘Temples lie open unto the fields’

    
(With apologies to William Wordsworth.)

Hard to believe Grand Masters Day arrives next weekend, but here we are. Summer is over; Masons are at labor; and my paltry speaking tour to raise funds for The American Lodge of Research resumes.

If you haven’t heard already (where have you been?) Grand Masters Day will be Sunday, October 7 at DeWint House, located at 20 Livingston Street in Tappan, New York. Just a short drive from Manhattan, and only five minutes outside Bergen County, New Jersey. DeWint House is worth your time on any day. It is open to the public, free of charge, Tuesday through Sunday. The meticulously groomed historic campus consists of the 17th century Dutch Colonial home, that also happens to be the oldest structure in Rockland County, and is famous for serving several times as Gen. George Washington’s headquarters during the American Revolution. (To learn more, click here. Also, scroll down to the Magpie Index at left, and click on DeWint House to see previous posts about this amazing site, including a number of photographs.) In addition, there is the Carriage House, which is packed with Masonic pieces and other antiques. Your eyes won’t know where to look first. In addition, the landscape itself is wonderful, with exotic trees and beautiful plants and flowers, and even a group of graves that will leave a lump in your throat.

If you’ve never been there, make plans to go, even if you can’t make it on October 7. If you do attend on October 7, be prepared to hear me speak. I am much honored to be DeWint House’s guest speaker that afternoon in the presence of so many Masonic dignitaries and friends of Freemasonry. (The good news is they’ve limited me to only eight minutes, so it won’t be too bad!) In “Temples Lie Open unto the Fields,” I will discuss DeWint House as a crucial example of the proper way American heroes and principles should be memorialized for posterity.

It all begins at 2 p.m., but there will be a brunch at 11:30 a.m. at ’76 House, located right around the corner. See the invitation below for RSVP info.

Sorry for the upside down text. The invitation is laid out for folding,
and for some reason I cannot rotate the JPG.


Hope to see you there.
    

‘Architecture and Psyche’

    
I came home to this in my in-box tonight. An encouraging message to help conclude this grim anniversary day:

As part of the C.G. Jung Foundation’s initiative to reach out to the many Jungian communities worldwide to share information and build community, we are presenting a new program, titled The President’s Lecture Series. By sharing information, we can draw together in our work to enlarge analytical psychology to its fullest capacity, benefiting a new audience of people in their quest for greater consciousness.

Date: Tuesday, October 23 from 7 to 8:30 p.m.

Location: Jung Center, 28 East 39th Street, New York City

Courtesy C.G. Jung Foundation

Speaker: Anthony Lawlor on “Architecture and Psyche: Experiencing Archetypes, Alchemy and the Collective Unconscious in Everyday Places.”

Award-winning architect Anthony Lawlor will discuss the connection between psyche and architecture and design. He is the author of Home for the Soul and The Temple in the House: Finding the Sacred in Everyday Architecture.

His presentation will illustrate the ways in which the design of homes and public spaces offers tangible encounters with archetypes, alchemical processes, and the collective unconscious. Doorways, pathways, places of arrival, and other common architectural elements provide a symbolic landscape for individuation. The process of extracting, manufacturing and finishing metallic ores, timber and other raw materials will be related to the alchemical process of transmuting the prima materia into the Lapis Philosophorum (Philosopher’s Stone) of experience. Finally, he will examine some of the ways in which design of public and private areas within a city embodies the codes and beliefs of the collective unconscious and supports the cultural rituals of its mythology.

Anthony Lawlor is an architect, author and teacher who focuses on the relationship between consciousness and design. His books A Home for the Soul, The Temple in the House, and 24 Patterns of Wisdom show readers how design and art can become allies in deepening one’s experience of the human journey. During 30 years of architectural practice, he has received awards for excellence in design from the American Institute of Architects and Interior Design magazine. His work has been featured on “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” National Public Radio, and numerous other national media. Lawlor received his Master of Architecture Degree from the University of California, Berkeley. Learn more about his work here.

To purchase tickets ($20 Foundation members; $25 public) click here and scroll down to the bottom of that page.