In 1816, General William Clark (of the Lewis and Clark Expedition)
built what was one of only a few brick houses in St. Louis. Clark
used the lower floor for business. Missouri Lodge 12, with its
Tennessee charter, met in a room on the second story there from the
time Clark completed the house until late 1817. Masons described the
house as "poorly adapted for Masonic purposes and inconveniently
located." They approached Brother Thompson Douglass, who was
constructing a two-story building in the center of town, and
persuaded him to add an attic, which the Masons could use. Were that
building standing today where it stood in 1817, at its spot in the
center of old St. Louis, it would be directly under the gleaming
Gateway to the West
monument, better known as the St. Louis Arch.
Frederick L. Billon was raised at the age of twenty-two in that very
room. Born in 1801, Billon lived to be 94 years of age in a life that
spanned virtually all of the 19th century. He served as Missouri's
Grand Secretary for many years and thoroughly chronicled Missouri
Masonry during that time. In his memoirs, he talks about one
particular meeting in that third-story room which he attended on
Friday April 29, 1825.
That evening, the young Brother, still a relatively new Mason,
ascended the creaky wooden stairs and as he entered the Lodge room,
he discovered two visitors. In Billon's words, "we were honored
by a visit from our Nation's distinguished guest, our illustrious
Brother General Lafayette, on the occasion of his visit to St. Louis,
accompanied by his son George Washington Lafayette, on which occasion
they were both duly elected Honorary members of our Grand Lodge."
The United States had invited the 68-year-old French aristocrat, who
had supported our country and commanded American troops in the
Revolution, to tour the country.
Billon writes, "This room was used for Masonic purposes… until
the close of the year 1833, when Missouri Lodge No. 1, under the
pressure of circumstances, ceased her labors for a time, and the
Grand Lodge was removed to Columbia Boone County." The so-called
"pressure of circumstances" he mentions is a euphemism for
the brutal aftermath of the Morgan affair.
For
sixteen years that nondescript
room provided
an auspicious venue for the formation of the
Grand Lodge of Missouri and served as its Grand Lodge offices. It
also saw the formation of Missouri's first Lodge, the first Missouri
Royal Arch Chapter, was a reception room for the great Lafayette,
hosted the ceremony honoring him, and saw countless other Masonic
ceremonies and events – all this
in an attic that was conceived
as an afterthought.
It's graphic proof that it doesn't matter where Brothers meet; rather
it matters how they meet, act and part.
