Masonic Lodge

This small building of great mystery still stands in Grey Street, opposite Steele Park, as it has done since 1877, one hundred and forty-six years since the foundation stone was laid. It was a momentous occasion with lodge members coming from all over Waikato. Two things in the lengthy Waikato Times report of the event (11 Nov 1876) are intriguing. The first is that a copy of the Waikato Times and some coins were placed in a glass bottle and placed in a cavity in the foundation stone. Those far-sighted people never foresaw Papers Past. The second was that the organisers chose the Prince of Wales’s thirty fifth birthday to hold this memorable event. The prince, later King Edward VII, was also a freemason.

Looks picturesque though, with the ivy, the brilliantly executed picket fence and a tweed suited, bare foot young lad in a boater – say 1895?

Contributed by Perry Rice, Whakaputu/Special Collections Librarian, Hamilton Central Library. If you have any information you would like to pass on or would like to buy an electronic copy of the photo, please e-mail heritage@hcc.govt.nz quoting: HCL_02356