What Come You Here To Do?

"I would not denounce or renounce Freemasonry even in order to become President of the United States." ~Brother Henry Clay

Many Freemasons have heard that iconic statement from Henry Clay, who served as Grand Master of Kentucky in 1820.  Most, however, do not know the circumstances behind it, and what else Clay said along with it.  Clay said it because, at the time, he was being courted to run for US President as the candidate of the Anti-Masonic Party!

Clay, who conducted the only Masonic meeting ever held in the United States Senate chambers, had become disgruntled with the fraternity.  He was fed up with the bickering, politics and hypocrisy he saw in some members.  Anti-Masonic Party members knew about his views and went after him to join them.  When he told them he would not renounce Freemasonry for the Presidency, he also said, "[Freemasonry] does more good than harm, although it does not practically effect all that it theoretically promises."

I've never really liked that view.  More good than harm?  It almost seems he's putting the good and harm on equal footing, with the balance barely tipping in favor of the good.  In my book, the ratio has always been something more like a million to one.

But, face it. It's the rare Mason who hasn't had at least a couple of negative experiences with his Brothers.

I've had them and it's at times like that when  Brother Clay has made me a believer.  We all have human frailties and, predominately for that reason, Freemasonry does not deliver all it claims.  That Perfect Ashlar is a goal, never a reality.

Searching for solutions to problems like these is frustrating.  An individual trying to change the direction of the juggernaut of Freemasonry is like swimming alongside the Titanic in an attempt to push it away from the iceberg.

These, however, are problems that will take years, perhaps decades, to fix; and no single person will make those changes — it will take a concerted effort. 

As individuals, meanwhile, we're left swimming alongside the Titanic wondering if there is anything at all we can do.  There is.

On one rather discouraging day things were seemingly coming down on me all at once.  As I sat brooding, staring at my PC, a message popped up: "Coffee klatch, today, 9:30AM."  A coffee klatch?  It sounds like something my wife, Carolyn, would go to at one of her DAR meetings; but this was something the Scottish Rite had set up — just a simple get-together for no reason in particular.

I went.  It was even less formal than I expected.  We didn't even gather as a group.  We just milled around shooting the breeze — sometimes two or three of us, sometimes a larger group.  That was it.  We just shared bad coffee and good brotherhood — none of the bickering, politics or hypocrisy that bothered Henry Clay.

Many of the problems we all sometimes face come from a few bad apples. But the majority of our members are friends and Brothers who can offer support.  I walked away feeling a thousand times better.  That's when it hit me.

The big issues will always be there and we should never stop working on them.  As for dealing with the frustrations on a personal level, the answer has been there since the beginning of our Masonic journey; and every Freemason knows what it is when he answers the question:

"What come you here to do?"

The Masonic Jig

I stand in the back of the Lodge room, acting as Marshal in this Entered Apprentice initiation.  The Worshipful Master turns and walks back into the arch formed by the Stewards' staffs. He stops and stands still. I wait for my signal. After about two seconds – TWO SECONDS – the signal doesn't come. And about five guys start doing the Masonic Jig.


The Masonic Jig goes something like this: the performer raises his hands in the air and then brings them down, almost violently, while flexing his knees downward. At the same time he whisper-shouts "Lights down! Lights down." The dancer performs the motion over and over until the room becomes dark. The astute reader will actually recognize this as a form of K-Pop. Who says Freemasons aren't hip?

The Master, as it turns out, was waiting for his signal to turn which he thought was the room going dark. I was waiting for my signal to darken the room which I knew to be the Master turning. A two second deadlock developed, which was other Brothers' signal to flail like monkeys on a hot griddle, at least momentarily damaging the dignity of the occasion.

I promise, in a couple more seconds I'd have figured it out and turned down the lights. Failing that, instead of the simian boogaloo I would much have preferred a single proctor saying, "lights down, please." Properly delivered the candidate might have thought that was part of the ceremony.

Ahhh… the Peanut Gallery. That ever-present bevy of Brothers ready to spring into action with corrections the instant a speaker says "your" instead of "thy" or "blessings and mercies" instead of "mercies and blessings." This affliction is a corollary to the Masonic Jig known as Masonic Tourette Syndrome.

These disorders are so prevalent in Missouri we must read a statement before each Master Mason degree prompting the Brothers to cool it. Paraphrasing here, the document reminds Brothers the Third Degree is a solemn and meaningful experience, not an opportunity to audition to become a Shrine clown.

When I was Master (Translation: "Back in my day, sonny"), I sometimes appointed a proctor and requested the other Brothers let him prompt for corrections in a more controlled and orderly fashion. This was somewhat effective although I have to admit I always appointed the most offending and disruptive Brother to that position knowing he wouldn't play second fiddle to anyone else, and would jump in anyway. It was cheating but the end justifies the means, right?

So, let's say it's a First Degree and the Chaplain offers this prayer, "Vouchsafe thine aid, Great Architect of the Universe, to this our present convention…" OMG! If that doesn't call for a nuclear Tourette blast I don't know what does. But here's the thing… neither the candidate receiving the degree nor any non-Mason reading this has a clue as to why. Let it ride, people! The words may have been changed but the meaning wasn't. The candidate will walk away thinking, "that was a beautiful prayer," instead of, "I wonder if God was able to hear the prayer over all that shouting from the sidelines."

Y'know, a letter-perfect ritual is great, but if I go to a meeting in Kansas, just 20 miles west of my house, I don't even recognize half the ritual. Again, the meaning is far more important than getting the exact words, in order, letter perfect. Heck, nobody can do that anyway.

I guess each one of us just needs to make sure we're not disruptive and maybe gently remind the Peanut Gallery to dial it down in the ceremonies. A little decorum does not go a long way. These ceremonies require large doses of it, especially when candidates are involved. I think the next time I'm Master (as if that would ever happen) I'll just hang a banner in the east that says, "Masonic ceremonies are not study clubs."

Mister Sparky

Summary

Mister Sparky, which bills itself as a national franchise of electricians, is, in my opinion, a scam. If you are pressed for time, you need read no farther. Just don't hire Mister Sparky (https://www.mistersparky.com/). This assessment is, of course, only my opinion based on the following experience.

* * * * *

Carolyn and I purchased a range hood for our new stove and began looking for someone to install it. She went to HomeAdvisor (homeadvisor.com) and entered our request with the specifics of the project. Within five minutes she got a hit from Mister Sparky. Impressed with the quick hit, we hired Mister Sparky to do the job. So far, so good.

Brian from Mister Sparky showed up at the appointed time and we briefly discussed the project. Then, Brian said he needed to see our circuit breaker box. This seemed reasonable since I figured he wanted to shut off the power to the range. We went downstairs and, without asking, Brian immediately removed the circuit breaker box housing. He looked at all the exposed wiring and began running off a litany of everything he claimed was wrong. He said it was an urgent situation and cautioned me the house could burn down if we didn't do something. That's when the red flag popped up in my mind – not about the circuit breaker situation, but about Brian himself.

To digress a bit, it's not uncommon to have an old circuit breaker panel that is out of code. We recently sold another house where that was the case. During the transaction of that sale, all we had to do was to agree to have the system brought up to code at our expense.

I pointed out to Brian we had been in the house for 30 years using that same electrical panel and the house hadn't burned down yet. I also told him we had been using an excellent electrician in town for that time period and if there really was a problem, I'd have him look at it as a second opinion. In addition, I mentioned, we would be using that electrician for this project except he doesn't  install appliances.

After that discussion, we went back upstairs to proceed, I thought, with the installation of the range hood. Not so fast. Brian whipped out his handy-dandy iPad and proceeded to give us a sales presentation on the Mister Sparky program designed, in his words, to monitor the electrical system in our house. He gave us several options ranging from $99 a year up to the-sky-is-the-limit, depending on the length of the contract and services we signed up for. Notice at this point the whole transaction has been about Mister Sparky trying to get us to sign a service contract and not about the installation of a range hood.

Just to get things moving I told Brian to email me the contract information and said I would look at it (knowing I would immediately delete it). So Brian, after about a 45 minute delay, finally got to the original job of installing the range hood. He then showed me the outrageous price for the actual job. I noted his service fee was more than the range hood had cost – by a long shot. Brian, of course, felt the need to inform me the real cost of appliances is the labor to install them. Exasperated, I told him just to install the thing and went off to do some work of my own.

Later, I came downstairs to find the range hood out of the box but no other work done. Brian was pacing around the kitchen in a tizzy talking to his office.

I had exactly two words for Brian, "NOW WHAT?" Inquiring minds want to know.

Brian said he had discovered the wiring for the range hood we had purchased was on the right side of the unit, but the contractor had installed the lead-in wiring to the left and it was not long enough to reach over to the right hand side. I asked why he didn't just extend that wire so it would reach (a question which, I later found out Carolyn had also asked).

Brian informed me that wire could not be extended and said he was on the phone trying to locate a new range hood for me that had its electrical wiring setup on the left.

Let's go over that one again. Brian, Mister Sparky's master electrician told me that a house's interior electrical wiring cannot be extended and he was conducting an emergency search for a new range hood for which he would no doubt charge me a fortune.

At that point I had two more words for Brian, "You're fired." I offered to pay for a service call and scrap the rest.

Brian blew up at me. He told me to forget the service charge and slammed the front door as he left.

Bottom line: Mister Sparky is more interested in selling you a contract than anything else and, in this particular case, Mister Sparky's representative was incompetent. In my opinion, never do business with Mister Sparky. As a corollary, be very wary of recommendations from HomeAdvisor.

Finally, shown at the right is the original range hood, which Mister Sparky said couldn't be installed, properly installed and working. The house hasn't burned down yet.

The Little White House

In November 1946, President Harry Truman, who had been in office just over a year and a half, was exhausted.  He had seen the end of World War II, made the excruciating decision to use atomic weapons, and soon would have to prepare an election campaign where the odds were stacked against him. Brother Harry, a member of Grandview Lodge 618 and former Grand Master of Missouri, told his doctor, Wallace Graham, he was exhausted. Dr. Graham ordered Truman to take a vacation in a warm weather climate.  The president elected to go to Key West Florida, which had a nearby naval station. The area also had an ideally suited house which had originally served as an officers' quarters. Later, the structure became the home of the base commandant. Truman stayed in the house and fell in love with the place. He designated it as his southern White House and made several more visits there during his presidency.

The location, just a three-hour flight from Washington proved to be ideal not only as a vacation hideaway, but was also a popular meeting place where staff and dignitaries were eager to visit during cold weather. Truman regularly made visits every November-December and returned each February-March. The "Little White House," as it became known, was the home of many important presidential decisions including the initial crafting of the Marshall Plan, the Truman Doctrine, a temporary cease-fire in Korea and the recognition of the State of Israel. It was also here Truman wrote his fourth Civil Rights Executive Order requiring federal contractors to hire minorities.

On a recent trip south, I visited the place and discovered a few more interesting facts and surprises:

The first surprise was visitors are not allowed to photograph anything inside. The guide explained this is a security measure owing to the fact that any Internet search for "White House" also brings up information about the Key West location. I thought the sanction to be a bit overdone, but reluctantly complied – no secret phone shots.

Harry Truman was good at a lot of things. Relaxing and taking his mind off of work was not one of them. It was supposed to be his staff's job to see to it that Truman used the time in Key West to relax. On the other hand, Truman was concerned about his staff members and wanted them to relax and enjoy their stay in Key West. On many occasions, the president sat in his living room looking calm while he was busy at work with his presidential duties, writing memos, letters and speeches. Across the room, his staff members tried to look at ease while they were busy managing Truman's schedule and running the show. No one got much relaxing done.

The master bedroom contains two twin beds. It was designated as Mrs. Truman's bedroom. On occasion their daughter Margaret slept in the second bed there. The president had separate sleeping quarters. It was, at the time, the policy that, even in the White House in Washington, DC, the president and first lady had separate bedrooms. In other words, you might be the president of the United States, but you can't sleep with your wife. This policy remained in effect until Brother Gerald Ford became president. It wasn't Ford who ended the policy, but his wife Betty, who described the arrangement as… to use a euphemism... bovine excrement.

Truman loved to play poker. One of the changes he made in the furnishings of the Little White House was the addition of a poker table. There, he would sit for hours and play poker with his staff and even national and world leaders who visited. The existence of the poker table was kept secret, the thinking being that the general public would consider poker playing to be scandalous.

On one occasion, the bevy of reporters accompanying the president cooked up a prank to play on Truman. Deciding the president, being a Democrat, must be fond of donkeys, they somehow got past security and smuggled a burro onto the grounds. They hid the animal in the president's detached bath house. The next morning when Truman went to take his shower he was greeted not only by the animal, but also by a large pile of donkey poop. The Secret Service was not at all amused and launched an investigation into the matter. Truman laughed off the incident and called off the investigation.

The tour made no mention of Truman's Masonic activities. I asked the guide if he knew anything about that and he told me the president did, in fact, visit Masonic lodges in the area and on occasion participated in Masonic events.  Knowing about Truman's love for the Craft, that didn't surprise me at all.

Since Truman's presidency, other presidents and leaders have continued to use the Little White House for various purposes. Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Carter all stayed there. The last presidential visit was for a 2005 weekend retreat for Bill and Hillary Clinton.  In 1987, the house became the property of the State of Florida, which restored it and opened it as a state historic site and museum. Today it is open to the public and offers several daily tours – no photographs, please.

Knights of the Wise Men

In 2011, velvet-voiced pop singer Lionel Richie, a member of Lewis Adams Prince Hall Lodge No. 67, Tuskegee, appeared in an episode of The Learning Channel's popular series, Who Do You Think You Are. The show follows celebrities as they search out their family roots, usually finding a twist or two along the way. After some digging, the show began to focus on Richie's maternal great-grandfather, John Louis Brown.

In Nashville, where his maternal grandmother had been born, Richie discovered Brown, most likely born into slavery, had married his great-grandmother Volenderver in 1890, when she was only 15 and he was about 50. Before their divorce in 1897, the product of that marriage was Richie's grandmother, Adelaide M. (Brown) Foster.

Knowing his great-grandfather's name, Richie went to the Nashville Metropolitan Archive where things got interesting as they took on a fraternal air. City directories there listed John Louis Brown as Editor of the Knights of the Wise Men in 1880 and SGA of the Knights of the Wise Men in 1885. The title of Editor was a valuable piece of information indicating Brown was literate – not a guarantee back in those days. Richie's curiosity was piqued wondering who the Knights of the Wise Men were and what the designation SGA meant.

This sent him to Prince Hall Lodge No. 1 PHA F&AM in Nashville where he met with Professor Corey Walker, Brown University Historian of African Studies. The program makes no mention if Professor Walker is a Mason.  With a prominent Square and Compasses in the background Walker explains, "Knights of the Wise Men was a fraternal order that also had a benefit for its members. The organization helped build bonds of community between African American men. It was an institution that provided financial benefits to all of its members for sickness as well as in death… It was the precursor of what we think of as modern insurance companies."

According to the show, the Knights of the Wise Men was founded in 1879 to address the needs of the black community. Walker reminds Richie that during that period white organizations were separate and did not admit African Americans. Pushed away from the white community after the Civil War, blacks created their own institutions to assist African Americans. One of these was the Knights of the Wise Men, which grew to 278 lodges by 1882. "These were the prototypes," says Walker, "of the organizations that helped propel the modern Civil Rights movement."

When Richie questions Walker about the meaning of SGA, he learns it stands for Supreme Grand Archon. "He wasn't just a member of the organization, he was its national leader." In addition, Professor Walker produces a book of the order's rules, laws, and regulations which Brown authored. The book contains lectures, signs and passwords, much like today's Masonic rituals, "J.L. Brown was at the forefront in building a significant institution to meet the needs of African Americans across the nation."

A newspaper article reveals the fate of the Knights of the Wise Men when it reports on an 1891 smallpox epidemic, which caused the organization to have to pay out substantial death benefits, draining the treasury. In addition, the article reports on the disappearance of its treasurer, S. Carl Walker, who ran off with much of the remaining funds. With that tipping point the Knights of the Wise Men began its decline.

Brother Richie points out this is the same period during which Brown's marriage fell apart, and the pressures of the demise of the Knights may have had something to do with it, concluding, "My great-grandfather went from being a scoundrel in my mind all the way to being one of the pioneers of the Civil Rights movement."

J.L. Brown moved to Chattanooga after the demise of the Knights of the Wise Men. Richie travels there to find out what happened to his great-grandfather. There, he discovers Brown became a cemetery caretaker and finds a book containing his picture. Brown's death certificate reveals his father was a Morgan Brown, his mother unknown. He is buried in the same cemetery where he worked, in an unmarked pauper's grave.

A final bit of research shows Brown was a slave, his owner being a Morgan W. Brown. In a confusing twist Richie finds a Dr. Morgan Brown had a son, Morgan W. Brown. Dr. Brown's diary reveals J.L. Brown's mother was a slave named Mariah, whom he stipulates to be freed, along with J.L., upon his death. The show leaves it to speculation as to whether Dr. Morgan Brown, 80, or his son Morgan W. Brown, 39, was J.L.'s father.

Documents shown in the program reveal John Lewis Brown died in 1931 at the age of 92. Writing of his fraternity he said, "We believe that an acre of noble oaks is worth more than a countryside full of brush wood, and that one true and loyal Knight is worth more... than a Chamber room full of trash. We fully recognize the fact that we are poor and need no weights upon us, and to make our way successfully through life requires thorough organization of the masses, without which our future cannot be a bright one. It is only by our good qualities rightly set forth that we are to succeed in the future. First by educating every boy and girl and teaching from the cradle to the grave honesty, industry, economy of time and means, and the fullest enjoyment of all rights as citizens, and the destruction, death and burial of the accursed idea that the negro is inferior, simply because he has been in time deprived of life, liberty and property. Let us all be wise men and women."

Other sources indicate that prior to the fallout from the smallpox epidemic and the treasurer depleting its funds, the Knights of the Wise Men had a peak membership of about 350 lodges. It is recognized by some as the first insurance company in the United States. Today, on St. Helena Island in South Carolina, stands a building known as the Knights of Wise Men Lodge. A wood frame building built in 1899, it burned in 1940, and was replaced with the existing concrete structure which stands as the last remnant of a once-noble fraternity.

An Encounter With The Fringe Element

I suppose we've all had varying degrees of experiences with someone who thinks the Freemasons are responsible for everything from running the Deep State to Jimmy Hoffa's disappearance. On a personal level, I haven't had many, but the following account is about one encounter I had years ago with what one might call the fringe element.

Back in about 2003, I was an IT consultant to a company where word had gotten around that I was one of those weird Freemasons. One day, I'm sitting in a conference room with a couple other guys working out the details of a database design. Across the room another guy, let's call him John, was sketching things on a white-board in preparation for a meeting later in the day. All was quiet and businesslike when in walks the corporate nutball – let's call him Tom.

Tom was a piece of work. The views he openly and freely expressed made the flat-earthers look like top scientists. He bought into every conspiracy theory around and some I think he made up on his own. On top of that, Tom had a temper. One day when his desk phone wasn't working he decided to express his displeasure by flinging it across the room, which left the wires behind the jack broken and dangling out of the wall while the phone just missed a plate glass window and shattered when it hit the wall. Some of his outbursts were more mild. Apparently he didn't get fired because he was a good programmer – it was almost like he was an idiot-savant… with less emphasis on the savant part. I always found it a good practice to stay away from Tom.

John, on the other hand, was a quiet guy with a good sense of humor. We worked together on a few things and I thought I got to know him pretty well. On occasion we went to lunch together. He was charming, friendly and popular. He had, as far as I could see, only one drawback. He hung around a lot with Tom.

So while I was working with my team, Tom walked up to John on the other side of the room and they started talking at a level that was inaudible to me. Suddenly, as loud as he could manage, Tom yelled a single word – something that would be familiar to us all – the password of a Master Mason, "Xxxxxxxxx!"

On the other side of the room, the three of us turned to look at the aftermath of Tom's Tourette-like outburst. The two guys with me merely saw it as another one of Tom's Whiskey Tango Foxtrot moments; but I knew it was directed at the weird one… the goat-riding devil-worshipper… the Illuminati… me. Oh, Tom, you clever boy, you know the password. You've broken the centuries-old Masonic code. Did you find it on one of the 10,000 websites that list it, or did God himself reveal it to you? The password's echo faded, the conference room fell silent, and we all went back to work as if nothing had happened.

Out in the bullpen, John's workstation and mine were next to each other, so we interacted, bantered, and joked back and forth a lot. I never asked him what he thought of Tom's outburst and he never mentioned it. He proved to be bright and level-headed. Then one day he shocked me when he asked for a petition. I was thrilled. This young, articulate guy was exactly the kind of man we would want in the Fraternity.

I brought him one the next day. He lived too far away to petition my Lodge, but I told him I would put him in touch with Lodges in his area. I said I could not be his first-line signer since he would not be petitioning my Lodge (a rule in Missouri that has since been rescinded), but would put him in touch with someone who could do that. I also explained the petitioning process and told him he would be meeting with an investigating committee. He took the petition and thanked me.

Later that day I walked into another area of the office. There I saw Tom and John going over the petition together. That's when I realized John never wanted to join the Freemasons. What he and Tom really wanted was to see the dastardly things a Masonic candidate had to reveal about himself and agree to, in order to join the evil empire. I'm pretty sure Tom and John didn't notice I saw them dissecting the petition. Needless to say, John never brought it back to me and I never mentioned it again.

Hey, I'm a Master Mason. It wasn't the first time I'd been hoodwinked.

Words To Ponder

In addition to a lot of the research I do for the things I write, I'm also responsible for contributing to my Lodge of Research Twitter and Facebook accounts. All that has left me with a rather extensive collection of quotes, quips and words of wisdom from a variety of Freemasons. Every day I discover more amazing facts about our Craft and the Brothers who have made it what it is. The more Masonic research I do, the more I realize what a stunning and positive impact Freemasonry has had on our country and the world. With that in mind, I thought I'd share a few of my favorite quotes from our Brothers:

"I don't suppose any organization has done so much for so many with so little selfishness as the Masonic Fraternity." ~Thomas E. Dewey

"The more I come in contact with the Masonic fraternity, the more impressed I am with our great charitable work." ~Franklin Roosevelt

"A pessimist makes difficulties of his opportunities and an optimist makes opportunities of his difficulties." ~Harry S. Truman

"I always advise people never to give advice." ~P.G. Wodehouse

"A thorough knowledge of the Bible is worth more than a college education." ~Theodore Roosevelt

"My Lodge had at least 4 creeds. I was entered by a Hindu, passed by a Mohammedan and raised by an Englishman." ~Rudyard Kipling

"Don't let yesterday use up too much of today." ~Will Rogers

"If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter." ~George Washington

 "Let us not paralyze our capacity for good by brooding of man's capacity for evil." ~David Sarnoff

"Anti-Semitism is a noxious weed that should be cut out. It has no place in America." William Howard Taft

"Courage is doing what you're afraid to do. There can be no courage unless you're scared." ~Eddie Rickenbacker

"Any jackass can kick down a barn, but it takes a good carpenter to build one." ~Sam Rayburn

"I'm proud to pay taxes in the United States; the only thing is, I could be just as proud for half the money." ~Arthur Godfrey

"Knowledge is ecstatic in enjoyment, perennial in frame, unlimited in space and indefinite in duration." ~DeWitt Clinton

"The man who doesn't read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them." ~Mark Twain

"If I had to choose, I would rather have birds than airplanes." ~Charles Lindbergh

"I am a Mason because care for those who cannot care for themselves." ~Danny Thomas

"We were put here for a purpose—to build not to destroy. If I can make people smile, I've served my purpose for God." ~Red Skelton

"A man wrapped up in himself makes a very small bundle." ~Benjamin Franklin

"The liberties of none are safe unless the liberties of all are protected." ~William O. Douglas

"Our world has nuclear giants & ethical infants. We know more about war than peace, more about killing than living." ~Omar Bradley

"The measure of life is not its duration, but its donation." ~Peter Marshall

"Fear... is something you learn how to deal with and set aside. You want to be alert as you possibly can." ~Buzz Aldrin

"There's no education in the second kick of a mule." ~Fritz Hollings

"Be sincere; be brief; be seated. " ~Franklin D. Roosevelt

"Life is tough. It's tougher when you're stupid." ~John Wayne

Perhaps fitting for the final quote, and one of my favorites, are the last words, as reported from his wife, of the founder of the Order of DeMolay:

"It is the beginning." ~Frank S. Land