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April-June 2009 Trestlebord Master's Message |
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Brothers:
Time seems to be going by very quickly. We are already wrapping up the first quarter of our year. We had a very successful inspection night in January that saw us initiate a new Brother who was then passed to a Fellowcraft in February. We have conducted three CT Chip events already this year, which were well attended and supported by the Lodge. Our Brother KC Chakravarti was even showcased in the Glastonbury Citizen promoting an upcoming event. Our Ladies at the Table was another great success with a sellout crowd. A big thank you to Brother Paul Finney and all who helped cook and serve that evening to make it such a great night. I want also like to thank all of the Brothers and ladies who came out that evening to this event. (Photos are posted in the Album section of our web site.) We all need to do what we can to support the fundraisers for the lodge.On a very serious note, our tenant, the church, notified us at the end of last year that they had leased a larger building and would be leaving. This has left a big hole in our Building Association budget. So with that being said, if any Brother of the lodge knows of a suitable tenant for our lodge, please contact either myself or the secretary and we will forward that information along to the trustees. WB Bob Flint’s and my contact information can be found on the 2009 Officers page and we have also added our email addresses if you would prefer to contact us that way.Just a reminder: Lodge dues were to be paid by January 1st, 2009. Any Brother that has not paid his dues, please remit them to Worshipful Brother Flint, so he doesn’t have to send you a reminder. We all know that we are in trying financial times and even our lodge took a financial hit with our investments this past year. Something every Brother should consider is a Life Membership in the lodge. The current cost of a Life Membership is 10 times the annual dues plus one year’s dues, which would be $1210 that would begin in 2010. There is also a three year payment plan that would work out to be about $477 a year for three years. The principal of the Life Membership is placed in Trust with the Trustees and your dues are paid from this fund. You younger Brothers will most likely save money over the years, and for the older Brothers, it is a great way to create a memorial to help the lodge in the future.We are also planning an informal Lodge of Instruction on Saturday, May 16th at 9:00 AM. Worshipful Brothers Walt Grube and Gerry Thompson plan to have a little get together of Brothers for coffee and doughnuts and a discussion about masonry. This is intended for some of our younger Brothers to get some of their questions about masonry answered, but any Brother is welcome to attend. The topics for the morning will be about whatever the Brothers that show up would like to know more about. Depending on how this initial session is received, we may schedule more of them.We had hoped to work the CPTV telephones for one of the Lady Huskies basketball games, but they were all taken up by the corporate sponsors this year. We did offer our services for another telethon opportunity and are waiting to see when they need us. We will announce it in lodge and via email when we are asked for help.We will have a very busy May, with our Awards Night on May 6th this year. Please return your reservations forms as soon as possible to WB Flint as this is usually a very well attended evening. And with great pleasure, we are hosting the District Deputy Presentation on May 9th to honor our incoming District Deputy, Worshipful Brother Anthony Keegan and his Associate Grand Marshall, Worshipful Brother Steven McMahon. I hope everyone marks their calendar and comes out to honor our very deserving Brothers.I am planning a public program on the evening of June 3rd. We will hold our annual cookout that evening which we will open up to all of our friends and family that would like to join us this evening. I am going to open lodge early, so right after dinner we can start the program. I have arranged for a representative from the Springfield Shriners Hospital for Children to come down and talk about the care that this hospital provides as well as the care available in the other 21 hospitals in the network. This should be a very informative evening, so I hope everyone comes out to see this program.Lastly, we had so much fun with the Ceilidh that we had last year, we are planning a similar event for this summer. This years event will be open to the ladies and any non-mason that would like to attend and will be an evening of “Bourbon & Bluegrass”. We are planning a dinner with some samplings of fine bourbons throughout and then we will retire upstairs for a Bluegrass show. At the time that the trestleboard had to go the printer, we are still finalizing details on the date and band that will play, but tentatively we are planning for sometime in mid to late July. Hope this is something that would be of interest to everyone and that we can support it as fundraiser for the lodge. Keep a lookout for future mailing or email about the particulars.
Fraternally, Brother Jeff
PDF of April-June 2009 Trestlebord
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