The Next Twenty-Five

A brief update to the “Retrospect of the Alwarestoch Lodge No 7805” delivered by WBro Tom Savage on 9th April 1997. Presented by WBro Paul Speak at the Rededication of the Lodge Banner on the 50thAnniversary of the founding of the Lodge – 21st February 2012.

Worshipful Master, Distinguished Guests, Brethren All When I volunteered to look back over the last 25 years of this Lodge, I had thought that it would be a simple matter to go through the past minutes and pick out a few notable facts to present to the brethren. I had WBro Tom Savage’s masterful history of the Lodge from before its official founding in 1962 and updated into the presentation that he gave on Wednesday 9th April 1997. He had done it, what could possibly go wrong? Accordingly, I sat down one evening and began to peruse the Lodge minutes. After half an hour or so, I began to flick through the pages more rapidly, scanning each entry in the vain hope that, just perhaps, the Lodge had NOT closed in Love, Peace and Harmony or that the candidate had NOT managed to restore himself to his personal comforts! I decided that a different approach was needed. Bemoaning this false start to our Bro Secretary, W.Bro Syd Aynsworth, he smiled, somewhat wolfishly, I might add, and told me to try looking in the minutes of the GP meetings. He remarked that I might find these far more interesting.

However, before I did that, I considered who I might be addressing this evening, and came to the conclusion that I was likely to be talking to a good number of people who might not be familiar with some of the facts surrounding the Alwarestoch Lodge No 7805. Not everybody would have had the benefit of Tom Savage’s history, so I felt that, for completeness, I would extract a few salient points and present them as an introduction. I had, originally, intended to ask the senior members of the Lodge for anecdotes and memories, but when I began to write, I found a number of unanswered questions which I thought I would throw out, in the hopes that the same members might be able to fill in the blanks for me!

The DPGM has told us something about our Lodge badge and I think that a brief “tour” around the various emblems and the symbolism behind them would be appropriate at this point. As one would expect, there are a number of Masonic symbols with which we will all be familiar. There is the black and white pavement, the columns topped by the terrestrial and celestial globes and the ashlars. In the centre of the badge, and forming the design of the Lodge banner, are two symbols perhaps less familiar to Freemasonry.

A Bishop’s mitre surmounts a portcullis, and it is no ordinary mitre. This mitre is that of St Swithun, the Bishop of Winchester over a thousand years ago. He, it was, who headed the establishment under whose auspices the ancient Manor of Alwarestoch fell. At the original dedication of the banner, the Lodge’s first Visiting Grand Officer, the VW.Bro the M Rev Edwin Curtis Provincial Grand Chaplain (and latterly, the first Archbishop of the Indian Ocean!), told the brethren that St Swithun stood for three ideals:

1. The worship of God – the Lodge never opens or closes without prayer

2. Benevolence and charity

3. Instruction and education – the lodge should be a place of study of the Ritual and the underlying principles of the Craft

The portcullis, when applied to the Lodge, serves to remind us of the need to bar that which is unworthy and to ensure that all who enter fully understand the ideals and principles of the Craft.

So, what has happened since 1987? My association with the Lodge began on 5 October 2001 when I nervously waited to be called in front of the GP committee to explain why I felt I had the qualities necessary to become a Freemason, so I needed to dig deep into the records of the Lodge to find out what had gone on before that, and truth to tell, after that period as well!

It was an interesting journey, and following W.Bro Sydney’s advice, I began cross referencing the GP minutes with the Lodge meetings.
What I was looking for was events of note, possibly irrelevant, potentially light hearted and/or thought provoking, that would show how Alwarestoch Lodge had made its stately journey to the end of the twentieth century and on into the twenty-first.

I have deliberately avoided reference to any particular individual (apart from one) because I wanted this to be about the Alwarestoch Lodge itself as a sort of entity, rather than about the individuals who, in their time, gave the Lodge its particular character.

I hasten to add that these are things which I, personally, found interesting, and as the proverb states, “One man’s meat is another man’s poison”. I apologise in advance if this whistlestop tour is boring, and I hope that these seats allow you to doze comfortably!

One of the first things I found was a dispensation from Province allowing the meeting due to be held on the 10th January 1987 to be held later in the month. Initially, I thought that perhaps this would be for much the same reasons as we have obtained a dispensation to celebrate our 50th anniversary on the anniversary itself. However, I could find no apparent reason for the need to hold the meeting later, and as I re-read the dispensation and the minutes, it appeared it had unexpectedly arisen around the intended date of the meeting, and had not been pre-planned. Interestingly, I could find no note of any commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the Lodge!

The next few years were clearly good years for the Lodge; there were nine meetings a year and almost every meeting is characterised by ballots for multiple candidates, a choice of up to four candidates for Initiation, Passing or Raising. In December 87, and again in April 88, there was a double Passing. In January 1989 there was a double initiation, in February, a double Raising, in March a double Passing!

The installation meeting in November 1989 was, to my mind, a curious affair. The WM had been delayed abroad, on a business trip and his place taken by the IPM. Nothing exceptional there, but as the meeting progressed, the Secretary announced that the Master Elect would not, for personal reasons, be ascending the Throne of KS and that the WM had agreed to continue in office for another year. Unfortunately, as he was not there, he could not be proclaimed until his return, and the meeting became the Installation that Never Was!

At the GP meeting in November 1992, after a discussion about the lack of prospective candidates, the members are recommended to consider proposing 2-3 candidates a year “in order to maintain annual programmes and improve our finances as an acceptable by-product”.

There is also a note that papers and lectures would be obtained to hold in reserve for times when no candidates would be available.

An intriguing note appears in the GP minutes for the meeting in April 1994 under the heading: Widows’ gifts at Christmas – All Widows are to be treated equally! I could find no immediate reason for the need to make the note and conducted a brief search back through a few years’ minutes to see whether there might have been a reason. There was none that I could find; another mystery, perhaps? Or was it a reason so mundane, so glaringly obvious at the time that nobody felt the need to make a note of it?

Interestingly, late in 1994, appears the first reference I found to the compilation of “a catalogue of Lodge deviations from the Emulation Ritual”, which is referred to in the next set of minutes as “the catalogue of Alwarestochisms”. It was obvious, just from those two preliminary entries how important they were to the Lodge as the reference changes from “a catalogue” to “the catalogue”! In April 1995, it is noted that “The Rubric and Ritual Variations have been compiled and will be passed to W.Bro Tom Savage for review”, and by November they have been printed and are included in The Lodge Minute Book with the minutes from the Installation meeting that year.

Another curiosity in the GP minutes was that there was to be an initiation in January 1995, and in view of the candidate’s stature, he would be expected to wear street clothing for the ceremony. This entry was annotated with the word “Action” heavily underlined. I pondered and searched for some time but apart from the notes in the Lodge minutes pertaining to the ceremony itself, I could find nothing. Yet another unanswered question to which someone, somewhere, might have the answer: not necessarily why street clothes were to be worn, but why the Bro Secretary had underlined it so heavily!

Apart from the request to recruit more members that I mentioned a moment ago, little is noted in the various minutes about the decline of Freemasonry in the last decade of the Twentieth Century. It is almost self-evident, however, by the reduction in prospective candidates for the varying degrees. Whereas, ten years before, there had been a plethora of candidates, double ceremonies and the like, the frequency of these ceremonies was declining. Often the WM would be demonstrating a particular ceremony with a volunteer, rather than carrying it out with an actual candidate. In November 1997 the number of meetings was reduced to the original Founders Format of eight meetings a year, the proposed alteration of the Lodge By-laws being approved by the Lodge after the Installation and ratified by Provincial Lodge in February the following year.

Sadly the decline continued and 18 months later, in May 1999, the Lodge approved the proposal to dispense with the January and March meetings. Provincial Lodge ratified the alteration later in the year.

Although it is a moot point as to when the new century actually began, the year 2000 began with W.Bro Tom Savage as Master for the second time (having been WM in 1966). This is not to say that this was the first time the Lodge had honoured a brother for the second time and neither would it be the last, but what was significant, in my opinion, was the length of time between WBro Tom’s Masterships, some 30 odd years, displaying his extraordinary commitment to the Lodge. I had not intended, when I started this project, to make it a history of his Masonic career, but it was extraordinarily difficult for me to sit and consider the history of the Lodge without considering how Tom’s influence affected the character of the Lodge.

For me, 2002 was notable because it was the year in which I was initiated into Freemasonry, but more importantly I note from the records that there had been a steady influx of candidates in the preceding years, so that ceremonies could be performed “for real”, as it were, with “live” candidates rather than carrying out a demonstration with a volunteer plucked from the floor.

Over the next four or five years the Lodge’s fortunes again declined, to the extent that talks were begun to discuss an amalgamation with our Mother Lodge, P.O.W. 1705. Fortunately that drastic step was never taken.

February 2007 brought bad news to the Lodge, in that Tom Savage was in very poor health following heart surgery a few months before. Sadly he passed to GL above before the next meeting and the Lodge found out that he had arranged to continue to influence the Lodge, by making a substantial bequest in his will! GP meetings are often punctuated with “Tom would have been happy with that”, “It’s what Tom would have done” and the like!

It is often quite difficult to be objective about things with which one is involved, and I decided that I would “skim” over the last few years, because anything that I selected as notable might seem to be somewhat self-proclaiming. I decided I would leave it to the Brother who volunteered to research and deliver the retrospect in twenty-five years time!

However, I will allow myself a small bit of trumpet-blowing! 2009 was another notable year for me, because the Lodge conferred its highest honour on me and I ascended the Throne of KS. It was, perhaps not the most noteworthy of Masterships, but I am very pleased to say that (with quite a good bit of help from other Past Masters, for which I am eternally grateful) I was able to perform an initiation, a passing and a raising, all with genuine candidates! I offer this as a demonstration of how the spirit of the Lodge continues in the manner I am sure the Founders envisaged, that of mutual support and encouragement.

One small piece of incredibly irrelevant trivia to do with this year is that all the Senior Officers in the Lodge were left-handed, and by default there were three left-handed WMs in successive years!

And so, WM, here we are, celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Alwarestoch Lodge and it seems only fitting that you should be in the Chair of KS this year, as the son of one of our Founders!

WM, thank you for allowing me the honour of monopolising the Lodge’s precious time, and to you, brethren for the attention you have given me. Post

1. After the meeting at which this short talk was delivered, I was approached by two senior Lodge Members. They told me that the gentleman whose stature had demanded the use of street clothes had been “a huge man”. Clarifying the point, they told me that he had been well over six feet tall with a giant physique to match. Unfortunately, they weren’t able to say why the Secretary had found it necessary to be so emphatic about the need for “Action”!

2. At the 50th Anniversary Dinner on 3rd March 2012 I was also told the reason for the January 1987 dispensation by the Grand Officer who had been the Master of Rowner Lodge at the time. It had, as I had suspected, been quite unplanned, in that the gable end of the Masonic Hall had blown out in high winds, making the dining room unusable. Apparently all the lodges bar one had deferred their meetings, Rowner Lodge being the “odd one out”. They had been able to do this because the Master’s wife and daughters had, as he put it, “rallied round and made enough sandwiches for everyone who attended”!