Writing on history, place, memory, and tradition
Every neighborhood keeps its own record. Some of it is written in stone and brick. Some of it lingers in archives, old names, forgotten institutions, and the symbols people leave behind.
BreteMurphy.com is a home for my writing on Queens history, New York City history, Freemasonry, fraternal traditions, and the ways place and memory continue to shape one another. This is a site devoted to research, interpretation, and the patient recovery of stories that deserve to be read again.
Welcome to BreteMurphy.com
Welcome to BreteMurphy.com
A Living Archive
This website is being built gradually — article by article, subject by subject — as an expanding archive of historical writing.
Here you will find essays on local Queens and New York City history, studies of Masonic symbolism and education, explorations of lodge history and notable members, and reflections on buildings, traditions, and communities that still bear the marks of the past.
Some of these stories are well known. Others remain hidden in plain sight.