Caldercruix St John 1314

T he Grand Lodge of Scotland granted our charter on 2nd August 1923. The consecration of the Lodge room & the erection of Lodge Caldercruix St John No 1314 took place in the Church Hall Caldercruix on Thursday 4th October 1923.. The ceremony was performed by the R.W. P.G.M of Lanarkshire M.W. Bro. Sir Robert King Stewart KBE, J.P. M.M No 7 Past Grand Master Mason, assisted by the Depute P.G.M. Bro. Colonel Peter Spence VD P.M. 88, Substitute P.G.M. Bro. Lord Belhaven & Stenton M.M 31. & The Provincial Grand Lodge Office Bearers. After the consecration of the Lodge, the R.W.M. & Office Bearers were installed into Office.   The first lodge Office Bearers were as follows. RWM Robert Samuels 166.  DM  George Cruikshanks 795.  SM Robert Jamieson 166.  WSW George Young 88.   WJW  John Kitchen 88.  Secretary John Welch 166.  Assistant Secretary Richard Oldham 429.  Treasurer John Bulloch 88.  SD William Hill 88. ...

The History of Lodge Caldercruix St John doesn’t begin in1923 [The year of our foundation] as you would expect, but the year previous in 1922.  An old retired Master Mason from the village of Caldercruix became concerned for the welfare of his next door neighbour whom he believed to be a member of the craft.  It was very apparent to him that his neighbour and family had unfortunately fell on hard times, were in desperate financial difficulty and were in urgent need of relief and support.  As a means of offering his Neighbour financial assistance this old Master Mason arranged for a support fund to be raised by setting up a petition in the village enquiring if any Masonic brethren in the village were in a position to offer financial support for his distressed neighbour.  When Bro. T P. McCafferty saw the list of names he was surprised at the number of Masons in the village. He called a Meeting of these Brethren in the Craig Institute, Caldercruix, & put forward th...