On
February 16, 1914, a delegation from the Cornerstone Masonic Lodge in Fergus
Falls traveled to Pelican Rapids to assist in the organization of a local
Masonic chapter, eventually known as Otter Tail Lodge Number 284.
Businessman R. B. Strachan was selected Worshipful Master and began a
tradition of community leadership that continues to this day.
The
origins of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry are lost in
the mists of history. Some
trace the movement back to the Templars, a military and religious order of
crusading knights who attempted to take Jerusalem back from the Turks in
medieval times. The order,
founded in Jerusalem in 1118, eventually fell into disfavor with the church.
Its leader, one Jacques de Molay was burned at the stake, for alleged
heresy, blasphemy, cannibalism, and sodomy.
Later, the Templars' beliefs influenced guilds of stonemasons who built
Europe's great cathedrals--hence the square and compass in the Masonic logo.
By the 1700's, the age of cathedral building being over, the guilds
largely became social and fraternal organizations.
When the Grand Lodge of Freemasonry was organized in London in 1717,
not a single stonemason was among the members.
Freemasonry
was highly respected in Europe, where its ideals of religious toleration and
equality attracted many members. Masonry
came to America in colonial times. Though
goals including charity and improving society attracted Benjamin Franklin and
George Washington to join, Freemasonry did not meet with universal acceptance.
Secrecy surrounding elaborate rituals invited suspicion.
In 1826 when Mason George Morgan of Batavia, New York, disappeared
after threatening to reveal Masonic secrets, it was widely believed he was
kidnapped and murdered by his Masonic brothers.
The Masons were condemned by the press, various churches, and by many
politicians. Hysteria rose to a fevered pitch.
The election of anti-Masonic
candidates to state offices in New York, led to the creation of a national
political party. In 1831, the
Anti-Masonic Party nominated William Wirt--oddly enough a Mason--to oppose
Andrew Jackson, who, though not a Mason, was rumored to harbor Masonic
sentiments. That campaign--of
course--was unsuccessful. When
national attention shifted to more pressing concerns--the abolition of slavery
and the war with Mexico, the party gradually lost favor.
Disconsolate members later formed the Whig party, the predecessor to
the modern Republicans.
By the
later half of the Nineteenth Century, Freemasonry regained it favor, with
nearly half of the American male population professing Masonic ideals.
The late Victorian Age was a stifling time for many, with tyrannical
social restrictions and a strict code of public conduct.
Masonry provided a socially acceptable escape from drab everyday
existence. Once inside the
Masonic temple, a member could shed his tie and collar, don elaborate robes
and be transported back to grand and mysterious ancient times.
Freemasonry grew at an astounding rate.
Between 1896 and 1914--the year Pelican Rapids' Masons organized--some
four hundred new lodges were formed nationwide.
Imitators
followed. There was a Knights of
Pythias lodge in Pelican Rapids, Parkers Prairie, and Dent; the Knights of the
Maccabees in Fergus Falls; lodges of the Brotherhood of American Yeoman and
the Royal Arcenam scattered across Otter Tail and Becker counties.
The Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the region's second largest
fraternal group, had members nearly everywhere.
American
Freemasonry got a big boost in 1933, when Adolf Hitler lumped Masons with Jews
and Communists and assigned them the blame for Germany's defeat in World War I
and the suffering of the Great Depression.
Suddenly, Freemasonry became identified with patriotism.
With
nearly three million members, the Masons remain America's largest fraternal
organization. They continue to
exert enormous social, economic, and political influence.
Locally, the names appearing on Masonic membership roles
reads like an historical Who's Who of community leadership--mayors,
judges, bankers, doctors, politicians, and policemen.
O. J. Lee, C. W. Sherin, W. R. Frazee, A. C. Meland, and Dr. Theodore
Satersmoen were all members of Otter Tail Lodge Number 284 in the early days.
Ironically,
the Masons' influence and prestige continues to give rise to occasional
criticism. The Masonic bond, some
claim, transcends other social and religious obligations.
The Catholic Church remains officially skeptical--though some Catholics
are also Masons. The constitution
of Zion Lutheran Church of rural Dunn Township, until fairly recently,
contained a section cautioning against "conflicting loyalties" and
even forbade Masonic rites at church funerals.
And at the trial of members of the Posse Comitatus following the deadly
shootout at Medina, North Dakota, several defendants objected to the judge and
prosecutor wearing rings bearing the Masonic logo, calling them "Masonic
devils." Even today, an
occasional wild Pentecostal radio preacher blasting on the late night AM bands
will pick apart the imagery on a dollar bill, citing George Washington's
Masonic membership, and trying to make something of the symbolism of the Great
Seal of the United States, the pyramid, the "all-seeing Masonic eye"
and Novus Ordo Seclorum--"new world order."
After all, George Bush--who championed a new world order after the
collapse of Communism--was a Mason, too.
People
continue to fear what they do not understand.
And history, as they say, continuously repeats itself.
---Roger
Pinckney