By Jay Hochberg, FMS
President of The Masonic Society

Brethren, this is my final President’s Message to you. I wish I had come to this job at a different time, not only to avoid the problems of the pandemic, but actually at another stage of life when I might have been better able to perform. Or maybe that “best time” is not an objective reality. As we learn repeatedly in Freemasonry, we are given time, but what we do with it is what makes a life. Now I feel even worse. (Just between you and me, Bro. Oscar, our incoming President, tackles the Twelve Labors of Hercules every couple of hours, but you never see so much as his bowtie askew. Amazing.) Freemasonry teaches how time is a subjective reality. We are handed the Working Tool symbolic of how best to divide the day; later we are admonished to keep an eye on the Hourglass. I suppose we can be flexible in precisely how to interpret the Twenty-Four-Inch Gauge in practical daily application, but there’s no negotiating with that Hourglass. That’s as objective a reality as they come.

My journey with the Masonic Society is not finished. I simply am stepping outside the leadership team to join the Past Presidents—a tiny club of Masonic thought leaders whose limitless sagacity isn’t tapped nearly enough. Having been named to the Board of Directors on Day One in 2008, it will be strange to no longer be around full time. One of the obvious strengths of the Masonic Society is in how its leadership, both Directors and Officers, is chosen from various stations and places in the fraternity. Our Past Presidents are brethren I admire greatly: Roger VanGorden, Michael Poll, the late Bo Cline, Jim Dillman, Ken Davis, and Patrick Craddock.

And there’s a stellar crew moving up. My sincerest thanks to First Vice President Oscar Alleyne and Second Vice President Greg Knott. The coming four years for the Masonic Society will be a golden age simply for having these fine Masons at the helm. Also to Mike Poll and John Bridegroom, who create the most accessible and best looking magazine in the English-speaking Masonic world. I know I’ve driven you both crazy occasionally. I’m sorry. I have to invoke the “bygones clause” of Masonic brotherhood. (I think it’s one of the Furthermores in one of the obligations.) And Nathan Brindle? Our Secretary-Treasurer extraordinaire? I’m not sure we’d even still exist if not for his steady hand at headquarters. There was this one time he was on the phone teaching the IRS how to do its job while simultaneously applying the molten red wax to the membership parchments. Well, that’s the legend, anyway.

To the A-Team that is our current and recent Directors: John Bizzack, John Bridegroom, Eric Diamond, Reed Fanning, Gregg Hall, Chris Hodapp, (Chris, I don’t have words. God bless ya.) Mark Robbins, and Aaron Shoemaker: Thank you for your energy and input in steering the Masonic Society. I hope each of you advances up the officer line.

Many have come and gone through our team during these fourteen years. I do not intend to neglect anyone, but I must salute: Ron Blaisdell, Andrew Hammer, Jim Hogg, Mark Tabbert, and Randy Williams.

Cheers to others on the editorial team, past and present: Tyler Anderson, Christian Christensen, Mike Moran, Chris Rodkey, and Shawn Eyer. Hope I didn’t miss anyone.

But most especially, I thank all of you members of the Masonic Society. Of course without you there would be no Masonic Society. When I took office, we had 775 members, and I had hopes of rebuilding that number to more than 1,300, which was how many we had several years ago. I put the arm on many old friends and unfamiliar brethren alike in asking that they rejoin us. Many did, but not the hundreds I had daydreamed about. That only makes me even more grateful for all of you who support what we do here. When it comes to lodge, I am a small numbers guy, but for a group like the Masonic Society, a big membership translates directly into more action, like giving membership jewels to everybody to mark our fifth anniversary, or hosting that stunning weekend of discussions and festivities four years ago in Kentucky. We have plans in the files to support scholars who would research subjects in Freemasonry and travel to lodges presenting their papers, and if we succeed in rebuilding our membership we will have the funds to do that and more. Please tell your lodge brethren about us.

I don’t think I’ll attend Masonic Week beyond next month. My first was 2002, and I think twenty years is an apt time to exit quietly and allow someone new to have that seat in the audience, so I might not see some of you again. My main Masonic activities henceforth will concern my two research lodges. Please feel free to check my website—The Magpie Mason—if you’re ever curious about my whereabouts. I wish you all the best in life. Don’t ignore the Hourglass.

At my lodge’s September meeting, I decided to take home our cloth aprons and gloves for a well earned laundering. I’ve never poured so much bleach in my life! Naturally, this activity prompts contemplation of what it all says to the Masonic mind. Gloves are not worn in all Masonic lodges; actually, I think gloveless lodges outnumber we gloved lodges. What do they mean?

We in New York remember, from the lecture of the Hiramic Legend, how during the search for our Operative Grand Master, a dozen Fellow Craft Masons wearing white gloves and aprons, as symbolic of innocence, confessed their conspiracy to King Solomon. During the ensuing search for the Ruffians, it was learned that they too had clothed themselves in white gloves and aprons in making their escape. Suddenly, these garments don’t seem exactly emblematic of good and purity, so what are we to do?

It has been a contentious subject here and there in Masonic history. I bet every grand lodge has in its leadership some officer or cadre of officers or a committee or something that studies the rituals and orations, looking for imperfections and ways to improve the language and understanding of it all. In 1906 Michigan, it was decided to delete mention of gloves from the above part of the Third Degree because it was thought, incorrectly, that gloves did not exist in ancient times. The word “garments” was substituted, but the lodges rejected the whole proposition, so the switch was abandoned.

In 1734 London, Swalwell Lodge’s Master and Wardens decreed that any brother attending lodge without his gloves and apron would be fined one shilling. Of course, my lodge has these white aprons and gloves for its brethren and for visitors alike—which is good, because we don’t have shillings.

My suggestion is to regard our white gloves as lessons in equality and unity. Whether a brother toils all day in industry, or labors in law, serves in sales, or anything else, we in lodge assembled are workmen of like mind and shared ambition: to improve ourselves and to better the condition of mankind. One brother’s hands could be calloused and cracked, and another’s could be soft and manicured, but both Masons meet together on the Level, laboring in our gentle Craft.

You should have seen the aprons when they came out of the wash. You know how a three-fold cord is not easily broken? Try defeating the Gordian Knot of thirty aprons’ drawstrings tangled into one hellish mass. Thanks to Bro. Chad, Past Master of Arts and Sciences Lodge 792, now I know about delicates bags. The right tool for that job.

In closing, if you are in or near New York City, join us on Thursday, October 28 for the meeting of The American Lodge of Research. That’s Masonic Hall on 23rd Street in the French Doric Room on the tenth floor at 7 p.m. Masonic Society Founding Fellow Piers Vaughan and myself will be among the presenters. Hope to see you there.

(Secretary-Treasurer’s note:  My fault for getting this posted late.  We just spent six weeks moving house.  Mea culpa.)

Of course the huge news in Freemasonry in the United States these days emanates from the Scottish Rite Northern Masonic Jurisdiction, which hosted its biannual session in Cleveland at the end of August.

The biggest announcement, of course, concerns the abrupt change in leadership. Masonic Society Member Peter J. Samiec, who has been with us since 2009, is the new Sovereign Grand Commander of the NMJ! (Bro. Samiec is a New York Mason, so although I’m not a Scottish Rite member, I’m proud to see one of us in the Big Chair.) Congratulations, Illustrious Sir! I don’t envy you, but, seriously, good luck!

Also, and this was reported two years ago in the pages of The Journal of the Masonic Society, Greg Knott, a Founding Member of the Masonic Society who has served on our Board for many years and currently is the Second Vice President, was coroneted a 33° Mason. Well deserved, Bro. Greg!

I’m sure there are other Masonic Society brethren who either received the Thirty-Third and Last Degree or who were elected to be coroneted in 2023, or who maybe were honored in other ways, but I failed to find the information among the social media platforms. Please, if you know of other names in the news, send me the info.

And, in other headlines, Masonic Society Fellow John Bridegroom has been tapped to fill the Grand Tyler station on the Grand Council of Allied Masonic Degrees of the USA. Wonderful news! John has been with the Masonic Society since Day One way back in 2008. He serves on our Board of Directors and is the creative talent that designs The Journal, ensuring it remains the most attractive and accessible of all Masonic periodicals.

One of my favorite Grand Lodges in the Northeast (second only to my New York) is Pennsylvania, where it has been announced that Masonic Society Member Yasser Al-Khatib is the new District Deputy Grand Master of the Sixth District. If you know, or know of, Bro. Yasser, you probably are scratching your head pondering how he finds time for his many Masonic duties, but he always makes it work. Oh, he also is the Master of Pennsylvania Lodge of Research. I’m tired just from typing all that.

Speaking of Masonic research, I’m no longer vexed by the claims posted in social media about alleged Masonic facts and biographies. I’m inoculated. Immune. Bemused. Case in point:

Around July 21 every year, the anniversary of man’s first steps on the moon, there always are messages of Masonic pride because astronaut Buzz Aldrin, the second to walk on the lunar surface, is a Freemason. Fair enough. We do like our famous Masons! The only version of events concerning Aldrin’s Master Mason Degree that I’ve heard in my twenty-four years in the Craft puts the future moon-walker inside Montclair Lodge 144, located in his hometown of Montclair, New Jersey. That’s how it’s written up in various books of history and trivia. Heck, many years ago, that night in 1956 was described to me personally by brethren of that lodge who had received the account as a sacred history of their (now defunct) beloved lodge.

So, around July 21, I see a post in social media in which a Brother Mason says Aldrin was raised in, and is a member of, a lodge in Colorado. Hmmph! I replied with the fact that Aldrin was raised at this Montclair Lodge in Jersey. He answered coolly with a repetition of what he believes is correct.

What’s a Masonic researcher to do? (To his credit, the Brother didn’t say “Educate yourself,” to which I only could have answered “I am literally shaking!”)

I follow Aldrin on a different social media platform, so I tweeted the question to him: “Bro. Aldrin, can you clarify a point of history that is confused? Did you receive the Third Degree of Freemasonry at Montclair Lodge 144 in your old hometown, or at Greenleaf Lodge 169 in Colorado? Both make the claim.”

I figured I’d have this wrapped up in about fifteen minutes, at which time I would savor my victory won on behalf of facts, logic, and reason. Aldrin still hasn’t answered. So much for the prestige of being President of the Masonic Society.

But I’ll tell you a secret: About twenty years ago, Bro. Gerald Reilly, over in the United Kingdom, one of my fellow seekers in the old Masonic Light Yahoo! Group, asked the assemblage if we knew where Aldrin was at labor. Having known that Montclair story, I answered him, explaining how that lodge is no longer extant, but that its successor lodge is accessible—and that I’d ask. I emailed the secretary about it, only to be surprised by his answer. I paraphrase: Bro. Aldrin didn’t pay his Montclair Lodge dues for many years, and the lodge carried him on the rolls for the whole time because, you know, he’s the second human to walk on the moon. But, after an inexcusable duration of never hearing from him, the lodge suspended him for non-payment of dues.

So, perhaps he parked his membership in Colorado, but was raised in New Jersey in a courtesy degree. Of course, if he was NPD’d by the New Jersey lodge, he forfeited his membership in Colorado, per Masonic custom. Oh well.

Now, on to that Charlie Watts-is-a-Mason nonsense.

Brethren, with the arrival of August, I begin the fourth quarter of my two-year term as the Masonic Society’s president. There was so much I wanted to accomplish, and the clock’s ticking is egregiously loud now. Anyway, this message is more of an administrative update.

First, I want you to know that Masonic Week 2022 will be a live, in-person event! That means the Masonic Society’s annual banquet will resume its rightful place as the premier affair of the five days of festivities. Update your calendar and plan to be with us on Friday, February 11 at 7 p.m. at the Hyatt Regency Crystal City in Arlington, Virginia. No word yet on the menu, dining fee, etc., and we are seeking a brilliant after dinner speaker. More on all that later this year, after the Masonic Week Planning Committee finalizes the logistics. (Also, last month, the voting members of the Grand Council of Allied Masonic Degrees, meeting virtually, elected to continue hosting Masonic Week at the Hyatt Regency for three additional years, so we all will be meeting there through February 2025.)

And at our meeting next February, you will meet our eighth president: Bro. Oscar Alleyne of New York. Oscar is well known about the apartments of the Temple, serving as a valued and indefatigable leader all around the fraternity, and he recently was elected to membership in Quatuor Coronati Lodge 2076 in London. How ’bout that?!

In the nearer future, you can catch me speaking at a few Masonic venues in and around New York City. Currently, I am finishing a presentation titled “How to Research a Masonic Subject,” which I’ll share with the brethren at my two research lodges and AMD council.

Saturday, September 11 at 10 a.m. – New Jersey Lodge of Masonic Research and Education 1786, meeting at Hightstown Lodge 41 in Hightstown, New Jersey. Plan to arrive by 9:30 for coffee—and to ensure we don’t accidentally lock you out of the building!

That very night and in that very same place, I’ll do it again for J. William Gronning Council 83 of Allied Masonic Degrees. Only AMD brethren may attend. Council opens at 7:30 p.m.

Thursday, October 28 at 7 p.m. – The American Lodge of Research, meeting in the Colonial Room (tenth floor) of Masonic Hall in New York City. Yes, The ALR is back at labor! After a period of confusion (don’t ask), we installed a new officer line in June, and we resume our regular labors. (And Bro. Oscar was key to getting us reorganized.)

If you cannot join us for any of these meetings, don’t despair! I’ll submit the paper to Bro. Michael Poll, editor in chief of The Journal of the Masonic Society, for possible publication.

Here in the United States, our Independence Day is upon us, and while I don’t feel right passing off someone else’s words in my messages to you, I have to share the following. It’s just that we don’t hear oratory like this anymore. I’ll refrain from editorializing on why we typically do not hear rhetoric of this nature from today’s Masonic leaders, and will only point out that what you are about to read is thematically consistent with two messages printed in the pages of The Journal of the Masonic Society. The first, in Issue 41 (Summer 2018), was the text of the after dinner remarks by Bro. Eric Diamond, one of our Board members, at our annual meeting several months earlier. The second, from this February, was delivered by our guest speaker, MW Bro. Akram Elias, and is summarized in Issue 52 (Spring 2021). But this is excerpted from remarks at the cornerstone ceremony of the Rocky Mountain Scottish Rite Consistory in Colorado in November 1921.

Masonic Lodges are a confederacy of moral republics—her temples, centers of law and order, citadels of stability—for aside from its spiritual, altruistic significance, a Masonic Temple has its utility side. It is as practical as a soldier’s ration. It has to do with government and with the home. It is an auxiliary in the State house, to the church, to legislation, and an active partner to any institution or cause whose aim is the uplift and betterment of man. This Temple will be a college of manhood, a university where Americanization will be fostered, a home of brotherhood and fellowship, and a sanctuary of friendship and a school of patriotism and liberty. It is the reserve line in every battle for free government, good citizenship, civic virtue, and education. It has enemies, as all have who aggressively fight ignorance, bigotry, and wrong. They affect our purposes no more than winds against granite rock, and to those enemies Freemasonry sends its challenge:

“Hammer away, ye hostile hands,
Your hammers break, God’s anvil stands.”

When completed, there will be built within this Temple an altar; upon the altar, a Bible; draping both, an American flag. Upon their knees, with hands upon these symbols of faith, every Mason must pledge his loyalty to God, country, home, and his fellow men. In Masonic Temples, creed is optional, loyalty to country and God imperative. All in all, Masonry is organized righteousness—mobilized patriotism.

Those words were spoken by Bro. Alva Adams, who served three non-consecutive terms as governor of Colorado. He also was prominent in Freemasonry there, having been Grand Lecturer of the Grand Lodge, and also the Sovereign Grand Inspector General of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite at that time. The couplet at the conclusion comes from the poem “Hammer and Anvil” by Samuel Valentine Cole, which I recommend to you.

If your lodge is reducing Independence Day to a cookout and maybe participation in a local parade, remember Adams’ clarion for a moral republic and a college of manhood.

Believe it or not, there is great diversity in Masonic rituals. What is worked in my lodge in New York does not match perfectly with rituals in neighboring jurisdictions, something noticed instantly when visiting a lodge in Pennsylvania or Massachusetts. In addition to the official published rituals, lectures, and charges, there are other pieces that sometimes can be added to your degrees and meetings. Perhaps you have joined a Chain of Union after lodge is closed. Maybe you have been lucky to hear the “Canadian Charge” (it goes by several names) after a Master Mason Degree. Some European forms of Freemasonry even have ceremonies in lodge for weddings and baptisms. That’s a bit much for my tastes, but here is an item I found while researching for a paper I’m writing. In the pages of the April 1915 issue of The Builder, the magazine published by the National Masonic Research Society, is an oration authored by brethren of Lyons Lodge 93 in Iowa. It is a charge a brother delivered to his son upon being raised to the Sublime Degree of Master Mason. Happy Fathers Day!

My son: Tonight you become a member of an order—not only of friends, but of brothers. In your life, as you master its teachings and experience its good influences, you will have a great mental growth.

Masonry fosters only the right doers; its principles, its teachings, its mysteries all tend to the elevation of man. Masonry gives maturity to the good character, and character may be likened to a universal bank. The deposits that are made in the bank of character bear an eternal interest. No thief can steal them; no panic can dissipate them.

The life of him who is pure, just, honorable and noble, finds within the tenets of Masonry loyal protection “from the evil intentions of our enemies.” We believe that you will be true and faithful to the teachings of Masonry, and we trust that you will so live that your words and your actions will be such as to brighten the memory of all the good men who have stood where you and I now stand—amid friends and amid brothers.

You are the son of a Mason who reveres Masonry’s teachings and stands uncovered in the presence of its sublime mysteries. If you will have your conduct in harmony with the principles of Masonry, you will aid my remaining years to pass in peaceful satisfaction.

You are not only my son, but you are also my brother. Believing that you will always prove yourself as being worthy of having been this evening “raised to the Sublime Degree of Master Mason,” I hope to be steadied by your arm as my son and as my brother when I depart on the journey whose goal is the realm of silence.

Even the All-Seeing Eye has a tear after that. Please feel free to keep this handy if you or a lodge brother ever comes to enjoy the honor of seeing a son become a brother.