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Photo by John DeHass, Historic American
Buildings Survey, 1963.
This image available for
photographic prints and downloads
HERE!
Masonic Lodge today, July, 2008, Kathy Weiser.
This image available for
photographic prints and downloads
HERE!
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Situated diagonally across from the old courthouse and
adjacent to Grasshopper Creek, this building served the citizens of
Bannack with a school on the first floor and the Masonic Order meeting
room on the second floor. It was built in 1874 by the Masonic Order, an
international fraternity, whose origins go back to the builders of of
Gothic style architecture during the Middle Ages in Europe. The Masons, or
Freemasons, as they are more properly called, were organized into lodges;
used signs, symbols and passwords, and were separated into different
grades or degrees of skills with the Master Mason being the highest.
This building was constructed in a modified or western
version of the Greek Revival style, with wood pilasters adorning the two
front corners of the building. The Masonic emblem, "The Square and
Compass," was carved from hard wood and mounted above the windows on the
second floor. The structure cost about $1,500 to build. As the popularity of Gothic architecture declined,
lodges began to take members, called "Accepted Masons," who were not
actually builders, but who would be a credit to the organization. Though
the Masons stresses morality and has religious overtones, is not a
religion.
Classes were held in the building for nearly 70 years,
before it finally closed in 1951, due to a lack of students. For the next
decade, the building deteriorated badly, and by 1864, the outside
stairwell, to the second story, was gone. Today, the building has been
preserved by the
Bannack State Park.
On June 23, 2000, the Grand Lodge of Masons officially
chartered Bannack Lodge (3-7-77) as the first Historic Lodge in the state
to help preserve the building and the heritage of Masonry.
© Kathy Weiser/Legends
of America, updated September, 2008
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