The Advance Lodge No. 635 cornerstone went down on a Saturday afternoon in November 1915, after a parade that drew several thousand spectators.
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The band played one hymn for most of the walk. That is the detail the Brooklyn Eagle kept, along with the aprons.
On the afternoon of Saturday, November 20, 1915, about 800 Masons marched through Astoria behind the Mecca Temple Band, with Knights Templar in uniform ahead of them and, by the Eagle’s count, several thousand spectators behind. They were on their way to lay the Advance Lodge No. 635 cornerstone.
The hymn was “Onward, Christian Soldiers.” The lodge had been called Advance for forty-eight years, and none of the sources remarks on the fit.
Why the Lodge Built When It Did
By 1915 Advance Lodge No. 635 had spent almost half a century in other people’s rooms. It had met above a shoe store, above a tinsmith, and, since 1876, above a tavern at 165 Fulton Avenue.
Its membership had grown from 97 Master Masons in 1900 to well over three hundred, and it had owned a lot on Grand Avenue, east of Van Alst Avenue, since 1910.
Financing the building took longer. A bond drive in 1914 got the fund to about $12,700, the old building committee was replaced, and the new one opened bids on September 24, 1915. Ground was broken three days later. The cornerstone came eight weeks after that.
The plan announced that day was modest on paper. The temple would be a two-story building of brick and stone, 36 by 93 feet, on a lot 45 by 146 feet, for Masonic use only.
The Eagle gave the cost as about $18,000 and the completion date as about February. The doors would not open to the public until the following April.
The March
The brethren gathered at the old rooms at Main Street and Fulton Avenue, in Astoria, which was then part of Long Island City. The corner is now where Main Street meets Astoria Boulevard at the top of 22nd Street.
A notice in the Brooklyn Citizen had announced the ceremony for two o’clock.
Led by the Mecca Temple Band, and by Knights Templar from York, St. Elmo, and Columbian Commanderies in full uniform, the procession left Main Street for Newtown Avenue, turned onto Crescent Street, and went down Grand Avenue to the site.
Everyone else wore the customary white apron. The lodge history adds flags and banners whipping in a brisk wind, and a police escort led by Brother William Keller.
The Eagle names four marshals: Ernest R. F. Ihnken, Henry O. Grieshaber, William Flick, and a Mr. Christopher.
The marchers were not all from Advance. The Eagle counts 800 Masons, drawn from the lodge and from other lodges in Queens. The spectators, who numbered several thousand by the same account, followed the column the whole way.
At the Site
Grand Master George Freifeld of Brooklyn conducted the ceremony, assisted by his Grand Lodge officers: Deputy Grand Master Joseph N. Wickham, Senior Grand Warden George O. Linkletter, Junior Grand Warden Charles A. Ryder, Grand Treasurer William H. Miller, Grand Secretary Edward M. L. Ehlers, Grand Chaplain Alfred J. Derbyshire, and Grand Marshal Robert H. Robinson.
The Eagle says that “the ritual ceremony of the order” was observed. Its report does not describe the individual ceremonial acts.
Two men spoke. Henry Martin, the lodge’s historian, read a history of Advance Lodge. The text survives and is the best source on the lodge’s early years. Henry C. Johnson, a past master and for years a leading Republican in Queens, gave the oration.
Martin’s account closed with the lodge’s numbers: 329 Master Masons, eight Fellowcrafts, and six Entered Apprentices on the roll, thirty-eight past masters since the first, and seventy-five brethren who had died.
He also noted that the lodge knew the business of the day. In 1890 Advance had laid the cornerstone of the Union Church at Ditmars Avenue and Albert Street in Steinway, with William Steinway as chairman of ceremonies. That time the building belonged to someone else.
The presiding Master that day was William K. Brown. The building committee, chaired by Joseph Gelson, was John I. Lovell, Christopher J. Stockton, Henry O. Grieshaber, John W. Owen, Charles F. Bales, and John A. Leach.
The trustees were Gelson, Stockton, and Peter J. Guensch.
After the Stone
The crowd then went to a firemen’s hall for refreshments and speeches.
The temple opened five months later. The fair that marked the opening began on Easter Monday, April 24, 1916, with delegations from lodges across the city, Boy Scouts guiding visitors from the Manhattan ferry, and Borough President Connolly speaking at the opening.
Townsend Scudder, a past Grand Master, dedicated the building on November 14, 1916, by authority of Grand Master Thomas C. Penny. At that ceremony, the lodge says, Scudder poured the corn, wine, and oil on Penny’s behalf.
James Prowse donated the cornerstone itself, and his part is the subject of a separate article in this series.
The cornerstone, to the left of the entrance, carries 1867 to the left of the square and compasses and 1915 to the right of it. The first is the year of the lodge’s founding and the second the year the stone was laid.
The stone is where it was set, at the building now numbered 21-14 30th Avenue. The temple became home to the combined Advance, Island City, and Mizpah branch in 1993, and later to Advance Service Mizpah Lodge No. 586 after the final consolidation in 2018.
The building’s longer story continues in The Advance Masonic Temple in Astoria.
The Advance Lodge No. 635 cornerstone is a small thing to carry that much weight. The procession is gone, and so is the hymn. The stone is where they left it, and the lodge still meets in the building on the first and third Wednesdays of each month.
Sources and Notes
Newspapers
- Brooklyn Eagle, November 21, 1915, p. 81.
- Brooklyn Citizen, notice of the ceremony, undated clipping.
- Brooklyn Daily Times and Times Union, April 1916.
[Before publication: add the specific April 1916 dates, article titles, and page references actually used. Identify the date of the Citizen notice if recoverable.]
Lodge Histories and Lodge-Supplied Information
- Henry Martin, “Historical Data of Advance Lodge No. 635,” November 20, 1915.
- The History of Advance Lodge No. 635 (date to be confirmed).
- Lodge-supplied confirmation of the cornerstone donation and the account of the 1916 dedication.
[Before publication: add the precise attribution for the lodge-supplied information and confirm the current meeting schedule.]
Note 1: Dates, Places, Figures, and Limits of the Record
The ceremony took place on Saturday, November 20, 1915. The Eagle of November 21 reports it as “yesterday,” and Martin’s address carries the date.
The site is described as Grand Avenue near Crescent Street in the Eagle, east of Van Alst Avenue in Martin, and near Van Alst Avenue in other papers.
The lodge’s charter date is July 2, 1867, following the Grand Lodge chronology used for this series. The Eagle gives July 8, 1867, and Martin gives July 3.
The Eagle gives the temple’s cost as about $18,000. The contract was $15,989, and the final report shows $17,905.15 for the building and $3,157.77 for fittings. Newspapers in 1916 quoted $25,000, $26,000, and $36,000.
The Eagle’s announced dimensions and two-story description differ from other planning accounts and the completed building. The separate temple article discusses those variations.
The Eagle names Stephen H. Graham as the Grand Master who granted the charter, while the lodge history names Stephen H. Johnson. This article does not name the signer.
The Eagle’s “Mr. Christopher” is probably Christopher J. Stockton, but that identification is an inference.
The building committee’s membership and chairmanship should be checked against the original source. An earlier working assessment found the committee list in the scanned cornerstone report too damaged to establish Gelson’s precise position. His trusteeship was reported separately.
The lodge history’s account of the gathering after the ceremony is badly garbled in the transcription, and the Eagle’s report ends with the ceremony. The size and menu of the gathering at the firemen’s hall are not established here.
Some earlier drafts included ceremonial details not established by the sources in hand, including the testing of the stone and the pouring of corn, wine, and oil at the 1915 cornerstone ceremony. Those details are omitted.
The pouring of corn, wine, and oil is placed at the 1916 dedication on the lodge’s account. The newspaper reports and lodge history in hand do not describe that act. The dedication date of November 14, 1916, comes from a garbled passage in the lodge history and should be confirmed.
Martin’s address and its transcriptions require checking for the wording of Prowse’s gift. The lodge history lists the gift as the cornerstone, and the lodge confirms that identification. The earlier wording describing a donation of the temple is not used here.
The old hall at Main Street and Fulton Avenue was in Astoria, then part of Long Island City. Fulton Avenue is now Astoria Boulevard, and the corner is where Main Street meets Astoria Boulevard at the top of 22nd Street.
Consolidations are given by year throughout the series.
Start Here · Series Hub · Timeline · Previous Article: Mizpah Temple · Next Article: Advance Temple · Related Directory: Advance Members · Related Member Profiles: Prowse, Johnson, Lovell
Related Reading
- A Cornerstone, a Dinner, and a Borough in a Hurry
- James Prowse and the Advance Lodge No. 635 Cornerstone
- Advance Lodge No. 635: Astoria’s First Masonic Lodge
- The Advance Masonic Temple in Astoria: A Lodge Building That Endured
- Why Advance Lodge Named Itself After the USS Advance
- Series Hub: Advance Service Mizpah Lodge No. 586
