Lodge hall

View of the East from the entrance to the lodge room.

Several people asked about the meeting room where we had the DeMolay investitures this past Sunday, seeing the hieroglyphics and stuff in the background of the pictures. We met at Naval Masonic Lodge on Capitol Hill. They have an old building that dates back to 1893. The lodge room is up on the fourth floor, and I think it's one of the prettiest lodge rooms in town. Probably a hundred years ago (it would be cost-prohibitive to do it today), someone painted Egyptian symbols, motifs, and hieroglyphics on the walls and affixed gold leaf stars on the ceiling. To my knowledge, there is no special Masonic "meaning" or secret to the designs; they are purely decorative. Now, up in the East (where the master or president sits during meetings), there are some Masonic symbols like trowels, books, squares and compasses, etc. painted around the opening, but that's it, and those aren't Egyptian.



Views of the West and the South in the lodge room.

Up in a balcony organ loft, they have a very interesting old pipe organ. It needs a little bit of maintenance (the pedal division is dead), but it could be a fun little instrument. It's only ten ranks, but that was probably a "normal" size for the space at the time it was installed. The swell and great each have only four ranks, and there're just two ranks in the pedal division, but they've got couplers to supplement things. It all sounds rather like a reed organ, and it has stiff tracker action. Couldn't find a manufacturer's label or mark anywhere, so I don't know who made it.

M.P. Möller was at the height of operation in nearby Hagerstown, Maryland, about the time the lodge room was built and furnished, so I'm curious whether or not this might be a small Möller. That would require opening up some things and digging around, though—dusty, dirty work.

One of the unique things about the building itself is the tiny, manually-operated elevator. Most people are going to prefer to use the stairs to walk up. The elevator is crowded with three people in it. This is the only manually-operated elevator I've been in in decades.

Anyway, that's the story about the room we used.