My Visit to Franklin Lodge

My visit to Franklin Lodge in Westerly RI for their annual communication was a great success, the lodge is amazing and the job done by all the brothers was very impressive.

A few notes of interest from the evening (and all are from the public portion of the night). Franklin lodge was named after Ben Franklin and the annual was held the day before his birthday. Their secretary was stepping down after 40 years in the position and received certificates from the RI Senate as well as one from Senator Whitehouse. The Gavel used by the Right Worshipful McGuire District Deputy Grand Master for the Centrsl District was made in 1929. And finally, the outgoing Worshipful Master of the lodge wore his father-in-laws Past Master pin which was a nice gesture of his part.

It was much too dark by the time we arrived at the Lodge for any quality photos but here is a photo of the lodge from the RIMasons.org web site, what a beautiful house!



The lodge room, very impressive and well maintained.



The acoustics in this room were amazing!



Here I am in one of the first floor rooms, one of four such rooms.



Another of the rooms, the lodge makes quite the impression!

New Years Resolution

A new year brings forth what is called "New Years Resolutions" where most people try to rid themselves of unwanted bad habits, usually involving their weight or cigarette smoking. I decided this year that I would attempt to visit every Masonic Lodge in my home state of Rhode Island. On my road trip to Ohio last summer I went out of my way to visit as many lodges as I could and it wasn't until I was driving the eight hours home that I realized that I had not even been to all the lodges in my own state!

So this year I will do my best to attend all 20 lodges in the state. Wait a second, isn't there 25 lodges in the state? True but while looking at the schedule along with the fact that all the lodges go dark during July and August I had to trim down the list a little to make it obtainable.

What I did was change the resolution to visit every physical lodge in the state, there are three physical lodges which house eight lodges so I will be visiting those three lodges once. So, 20 lodges in what amounts to 10 months, or two a month, in addition to my home lodges functions and meetings. That seems realistic with a bit of effort, wish me luck!