By William “Skip” Deegans
One-hundred years ago, on November 17, 1925, the corner stone was placed on the new Masonic Temple building of Greenbrier Lodge No. 42 on Lewisburg’s Court Street. There were Masonic ceremonies by the Most Worshipful Grand Lodge of West Virginia. Framed in steel, the top floor of the four-story building was reserved for Masonic purposes. On the next floor were offices with the post office and other businesses occupying the ground floor. The basement contained a barber shop, kitchen and dining room.
On December 5, 1796, Lewisburg’s first Masonic lodge, Greenbrier Lodge 49, was granted a charter by the Grand Lodge of Virginia. It may have been the first lodge west of the Allegheny Mountains. In 1868, the Fort Union Lodge No. 49 was organized in Lewisburg. There is some evidence that differences over the Civil War caused Lewisburg to have two lodges yet they shared the same temple. The two lodges finally consolidated in 1877 when the Grand Lodge of West Virginia granted a charter to the Greenbrier Lodge 42.
The first Masonic Lodge was in a stone building called “The Old Stone Lodge.” The fraternity sold this building in 1899 to the Board of Education for use as a school for African-American children. In 1858, the order bought the Supreme Court of Virginia building (across the highway from the North House Museum) and operated there until 1917 when it moved to a room over the Lewisburg Drug Store until the Court Street building was completed.
Shown in the undated photo is the Lewisburg Post Office staff standing in front of the Masonic Temple building. From left to right: John H. Sibold, Mrs. Emma Henderson, N. W. Russell, Mrs. Janie Ott Kirkpatrick and Frank Zimmerman.
Sources: The West Virginia News, Independent-Herald, Masonic Sketches.
Photo courtesy of the Greenbrier Historical Society.
