Arcana Lodge #187
Ancient Free & Accepted Masons

920 Lowry Avenue NE
Minneapolis, Minnesota, 55418, USA

News from the East

In 1955 the University of Minnesota was asked if there was something the Masons could do with the University Hospital.  The University wondered if the Masons could build an 80 bed hospital for terminal cancer patients and raise half (one Million dollars) of the estimated cost if the U found the other half. Thus began a remarkable relationship between Minnesota Masonry and the University of Minnesota.

A "Committee of 100" from the various Masonic bodies met and organized as the Masonic Cancer Relief Committee, then later as the Masonic Memorial Hospital Fund, and now as the Masonic Cancer Center Fund.  It raised the one million dollars to help build the Masonic Memorial Hospital.  Over the years, the growing facility eventually became known as the Masonic Cancer Center and is supplemented by the addition of four floors to another building on campus, the Masonic Cancer Research Building.  The Order of Eastern Star has been a large player in all this and in 1955, a floor in the Masonic Research Building was named the Eastern Star Floor.

Since 1955, Masons and related bodies have donated about twenty million dollars to the Masonic Cancer Center.  In 1960 and again in 1986, the University conferred its highest honor, the Reagents Award, upon the Masonic Fraternity.

The fifty year old Masonic Cancer Center has become grossly inadequate to handle the growing demand for cancer treatment and research (they're using rooms for examining rooms that were once closets , etc.  - -  talk about togetherness).  In 2005, a new campaign was started, called Partners For Life, to raise Ten Million Dollars for a new treatment facility and another Five Million for the Endowment Fund.

In past years, we in Arcana Lodge have enjoyed a steak dinner, for which the entire proceeds went to a worthy cause.  The price is nominally $25, or as much as you can possibly afford.  This fall, we will have such a dinner, with the proceeds going to Partners For Life.  I have asked the Cancer Center Fund to bring their Power Point presentation of Partners For Life that evening.

I was gratified to have a courtesy raising of two new young brothers (Antwan Winston and Joseph Yetman) at Braden Lodge in St. Paul on Thursday June 7th.  MWB Don Severson presided in the East on the second section for our two candidates.  He is the best!

We are happy to see that there are young men showing a strong interest in Masonry and seeking membership.  Many of them are discovering us as they surf the internet, so it is in our best interest that WB Doug Roswold maintains the Arcana Website.

On the subject of Doug, no one can deny that the job of secretary is very big. WB Doug lives in White Bear Lake and commutes daily to his job in a West Metro suburb. In addition, he cooks our monthly dinners and the Spaghetti Dinner, serves on the Board of Trustees, and tries to find time to edit, print and distribute the Trestle Board, which depends, among other things, on others getting their articles in on time.

When you read this, we will have been in the Northeast Parade on June 18th, and will have conducted a KidsID service to the community on June 23rd.  One of these days, we hope to tell you about things like this ahead of time.

On the August 21st for a Summer Social in the Lodge the Eastern Star served typical picnic food, including Sloppy Joes, hot dogs, chips, pie, ice cream, build-your-own sundaes, pie ala mode. This was not a fund raiser, but strictly for fraternal socialability.  Coming up on Wednesday, September 19, 6:00 PM, at Kordiak Park in Columbia Heights Arcana will have a BBQ picnic for our members and families.  The Lodge will provide refreshments, burgers and brats again with WB Doug manning the grill, and we ask that everyone bring a salad or desert to share pot-luck style.  Keep it in mind.

Vern Bandel, Master

Masonic Light

  After reading a list of how many Freemasons have done things that added to the everyday world around us, I began to wonder what would be the ultimate 'Freemason' day...

*                    *                    *

  In a crash of cymbals, you awake to the alarm clock playing "The Star Spangled Banner" (Francis Scott Key). Extracting yourself from the tangle sheets as if you were a professional escape artist (Harry Houdini), you put on the kettle (Paul Revere), grab a quick shave (King C. Gillette), drink a fast cup of tea (Sir Thomas Lipton), hop into your car (Walter P. Chrysler), and drive downtown to have a proper breakfast at a local restaurant (Bob Evans).

  Finished with the meal, you feel like a million dollars (John Jacob Astor), generously tip the waitress with a fistful of one dollar bills (George Washington), and drive away humming the lyrics to "Route 66" (Nat 'King' Cole).

  Turning on the radio, you chuckle as the local DJ does a spoof of the classic comedy routine, "Who's On First?" (Bud Abbott and Lou Costello), followed by an up-dated version of the incredibly funny routine of why nobody should drink water (W.C. Fields).

  Suddenly, you pass an old vaudeville theatre (Eddie Cantor, Jack Benny, George M. Cohan, Florenz Ziefield), but nowadays it is cinema multiplex showing: "The Ten Commandants" (Cecile B. deMille), "Aladdin" (Walt Disney), "My Favorite Brunette" (Bob Hope), "The Right Stuff" (Leroy Cooper, John Glenn, Virgil 'Gus' Grissom, Edwin 'Buzz' Aldrin and Walter Schirra of the original Mercury astronauts), "Gone With The Wind" (Clark Gable and Darryl F. Zanuck), "The Pink Panther" (Peter Sellers), the original version of "Tarzan" (Elmo Lincoln), "A Day At The Races" (Harpo Marx), "Some Like It Hot" (Joe E. Brown), "El Dorado" (John Wayne), and a retrospective of various silent films (Harold Lloyd, Buster Keaton), mixed with some classic cartoons (Mel Blanc).

  Pausing at an intersection to let a marching band play by (John Phillip Souza), you're delighted to observe that it's announcing the arrival of the circus into town (all of the Ringling Brothers). Apparently, they have the actual "Spirit of St. Louis" (Charles Lindbergh), along with a full-sized copy of the Eiffel Tower (Alexander Gustave Eiffel) on display. Which gives you an idea for work today. Hmm.

  In the elevator going to your office, you listen to some classic jazz (Count Bassie), then spend the morning drawing (compass and square) an advertising campaign showing the Statue of Liberty (Frederic A. Bartholdi) learning show to safely drive her new American car. (Henry Ford). Your boss approves of the design quoting that, "Art should enlighten, as well as entertain." (Voltaire)

  At noon, you leave the office at the speed of light (Dr. Albert A. Michelson) and considered having lunch at the local KFC (Colonel Harland Sanders), but instead decide on Wendy's (Dave Thomas). Relaxing in the corner, you eat your lunch while reading a couple of chapters from "World War II: The Gathering Storm" (Winston Churchill).

  Completely refreshed, you return to the office only to find that the boss has taken ill and cancelled his saxophone lesson (Antoine Joseph Sax) to visit the Mayo Clinic (Dr. Charles Mayo) to get a shot of penicillin (Sir Alexander Fleming). Left alone, you gamely start a new ad campaign for K-Mart (Sebastain S. Kresge) using Western heroes (James Bowie, Christopher 'Kit' Carson, Gene Autry, "Buffalo Bill" William Cody, Samuel Colt, David 'Davy' Crockett, Richard Gatling, Sam Houston, Tom Mix, Roy Rodgers) to teach people about the environmentally safe chemicals (Herbert Henry Dow) used to clean Mt. Rushmore (Gutzon & Lincoln Borglum).

  At the presentation, the client is so happy with the job that they give you free tickets to a musical comedy (Gilbert & Sullivan). You would have preferred a nice Elizabethian tragedy (William Shakespeare), you take it on the chin like a pro boxer ('Sugar' Ray Robinson) and accept the gift with a polite smile.

Humming some classical music (Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart), you leave work, and visit a bar to have a couple of cold beers (John Molson), listen to some swinging jazz on the jukebox (Duke Ellington), and discuss the greatest, if flawed, baseball player of all time (Ty Cobb). Before leaving, you secretly stuff a twenty dollar bill (Andrew Jackson) into the charity box (The Will Rogers Foundation) on the counter. After all, a good deed unseen is it's own reward. (Rudyard Kipling)

  Getting home, you relax by playing a little basketball (James Naismith) with a neighbor, send some romantic poetry (Robert Burns) via email to your girlfriend, buy a copy of "Roots" (Alex Haley) and "Little House on The Prairie" by Laura Ingalls Wilder (Eastern Star) on-line, then refill the cat-proof bird feeder (John James Audubon) in your backyard.

  While dinner cooks, you do some laundry (Frederick Maytag), decide not to shave your head bald to look like a famous TV detective (Telly Savalas), and finish that jigsaw of the White House (James Hoban).

  After dinner, you catch a Science Fiction movie marathon on cable: "The Portrait of Dorian Grey" (Oscar Wilde), "The Thief of Baghdad" (Douglas Fairbanks), and "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" (Mark Twain, a.k.a. Samuel L. Clemens). Briefly, you wonder if any of the actors in the movies belonged to a fraternal lodge, but decide that it would take Sherlock Holmes (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle) to solve that mystery.

  Turning off the TV, you jot down a note to remember to bring the coffee to the lodge meeting tomorrow night, set the alarm clock to play the bulge call 'Taps' (Major General Daniel Butterfield) in the morning, and shuffle off to bed to dream of freedom, religious tolerance, and world peace.

  Sometimes, with the help of a Brother, dreams do come true.

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