Rutgers University Masonic Alumni

Jacobites and Anti-Jacobites, Culture and Diaspora

2010-04-27T13:10:00.000-07:00

The international conference “Jacobites and Anti-Jacobites, culture and diaspora” will take place at the University of Strathclyde in association with
the Research Institute of Irish & Scottish Studies (Aberdeen University)on June 24-26th 2010.

Fittingly, Dr Andreas Önnerfors will present a paper on “Swedish Freemasonry and its Jacobite connections”.

This three-day conference will take an inter-disciplinary look at the importance of the themes of culture, diaspora, ideologies, and communities and networks on Jacobite Studies. The emphasis will be upon viewing Jacobite Studies as a broad historical phenomenon affecting societies, culture and political adaptation in the eighteenth century, rather than as a narrow dynastic cause. The conference will feature new research in the field of Jacobite studies from leading scholars from across the United Kingdom, Europe, North America and Australia.

Plenary Speakers include Breandán Ó Buachalla (University of Notre Dame), Murray Pittock (University of Glasgow) and Christopher Whatley (University of Dundee)

On behalf of the Jacobite Studies Trust, the conference is organised by Allan Macinnes (University of Strathclyde), Murray Pittock (University of Glasgow) and Daniel Szechi (University of Manchester).

For further details of the conference programme, fees or
to register please contact Jan Bissett:
jan.bissett@strath.ac.uk

Rutgers: The Public Ivy

2010-01-13T10:52:00.000-08:00

Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey was IVY before there was such a thing and later turned down a formal request to join what was at the time a newly formed brand of club. It is a leading national research university and is unique as the only university in the nation that is a colonial chartered college (1766), a land-grant institution (1864), and a state university (1945/1956). Many Rutgers departments are nationally and internationally recognized for important scholarly contributions and the quality of education received by students at undergraduate and graduate levels. The Graduate Anthropology program is conducted as a cooperative effort with Prjavascript:void(0)inceton University.

Rutgers Masonic Club will be meeting at the Cap & Skull

2009-10-12T10:13:00.000-07:00

The Rutgers Masonic Club will be meeting at the Cap & Skull HQ on College Avenue in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

On the corner of Albany & Peace St. in New Brunswick, NJ

2009-10-07T21:58:00.000-07:00

Masonic Ambiance of New Brunswick, New Jersey

by David Lindez, BFA, MFA, MSM

On December 27th, 1753, on St Johns Day, George Harrison had been installed as Provincial Grand Master following a Masonic service held in Trinity Church on Wall St. in New York City. Worshipful Brother Tuckey, was the Rector at Trinity Church at the time. These men would play a major role in the establishment of the Grand Lodge of New Jersey, which was set up in just five consecutive days, by nine Master Masons & three Entered Apprentices (MacGregor, 1929). Right Worshipful George Harrison Esq., Provincial Grand Master at New York, appointed William Tuckey as Master and constituted in Newark, New Jersey on May 13th, 1761, St. John's Lodge No. 1. Rev. Tuckey was a frequent visitor of churches in Newark, New Jersey. He could not understand the absence of a Masonic lodge in New Jersey, though he frequently encountered Scottish, English and Irish Masons as visitors in the various cathedrals of New Jersey.

New Jersey has the distinction of being the only Grand Lodge in the United States to be formed by individual Masons, rather than by three lodges. On December 18th, 1786, twenty-six brethren came together to sign association papers. More men met on January 13th, 1787 to do the same for a second time. Out of the 49 signatures, four came from New York and as far north as Albany (Lodges No. 1 & No. 8 in Albany, NY). At this second meeting, the Most Ancient & Honorable Society of Free and Accepted Masons for the State of New Jersey came into existence. The Hon. David Brearly, Esq., Chief Justice of New Jersey, was elected Grand Master of Masons in New Jersey. Most Worshipful Brother Brearly represented New Jersey in the Federal Convention at Philadelphia. He had been a Lieutenant Colonel in the army of the Revolution and a close friend of George Washington. He was a member of the state and federal conventions, and his signature appears on the Constitution of the United States. The other officers selected to serve were, the Hon. Robert Lettis Hooper, Vice-President of New Jersey: Deputy Grand Master; William Leedle, Esq., late High Sheriff of Morris: Senior Grand Warden; Daniel Marsh, Esq., Representative in the Assembly of New Jersey: Junior Grand Warden; John Noble Cumming, Esq., late Colonel in the Army of the United States: Grand Secretary; Maskell Ewing, Jun., Esq., Clerk of the General Assembly of New Jersey: Deputy Grand Secretary; and Joshua Corshon, Esq., High Sheriff of Hunterdon: Grand Treasurer.

References:

MacGregor, David (1929) History of the Grand Lodge of New Jersey
Reed, Ernest (1923) The Story of Freemasonry in New Jersey

COMMENCEMENTS.; RUTGERS COLLEGE. THE EXERCISES IN MASONIC HALL THE ORATIONS THE PRIZES AND DEGREES AWARDED.

2009-05-17T14:40:00.000-07:00

On June 18th, 1874, crowds of "beribboned" well dressed alumni, students and staff are described as parading down George Street in New Brunswick to the Masonic Hall "through a throng of sightseers." Along with the University President, the Governor of New Jersey, numerous other political and clerical dignitaries are present for the procession & commencement exercises for Rutgers.

Right Worthy Rev. Knight Piers A. Vaughan

2009-05-05T12:15:00.000-07:00

Brother Piers Vaughan is an academic Freemason, and has spoken at academic institutions and esteemed lodges of research around the World. He is a Past Assistant District Grand Lecturer and a Past Master of St Johns Lodge No. 1 Ancient York Masons in New York City. Piers A. Vaughan holds dual citizenship in the UK and the US, is a former resident of Manhattan and currently resides in Bayonne, New Jersey. Professionally, Piers is the Managing Director of Operations and Technology at Globecon located adjacent to the Financial District in Manhattan. He has almost three decades of experience focused exclusively in the banking and financial services sector working formerly for HSBC & Deutsche Bank. Piers earned his his MA from Oxford University (Exeter College) & his Masters in Music at Trinity College at Oxford and his MBA at the European based Cranfield School of Management. Piers is a Member of the Association of Project Managers since 1993. Piers has directed choirs throughout Europe & has performed as a solo vocalist in New York City and Washington DC's largest cathedrals. The Most Reverend Piers A. Vaughan is also an ordained & licensed minister in the State of New York, having been consecrated a Bishop in the Old Templar Holy Catholic & Apostolic Church & an Arch Bishop in the Ecclesia Rosae Rubeae & Aureae Crucis. Piers holds the lines of recognized Eastern and Western Orthodox, Armenian, Syrian, Ethiopian, Independent, Protestant and Catholic Churches and many others. Having founded the Rose Circle Research Society, Piers currently serves as its President. He is a Knight Grand Cross in several Chivalric Orders in Europe, a High Councillor & Magus in the Masonic Rosicrucians & a very senior FreeMason in various Orders around the world. He is perhaps most famous as a translator of rare French texts, a noted speaker and author. Piers is a subject matter expert on the Scottish Rectified Rite, a very old 18th Century Rite of spiritual Freemasonry with a Christian requisite starting at the Apprentice degree. Piers has reached the Ne Plus Ultra summit of Masonry as a Knight Beneficent of the Holy City in the Grand Priory of Belgium and currently serves as the Deputy Master of Willermoz Lodge No. 1, a lodge of Scottish Masters of Saint Andrew in the Northeast Prefecture.

Piers can be heard speaking at the House of the Temple in Washington DC here: http://xoriente.typepad.com/my_weblog/2007/02/episode_017m_ch.html

Creation: An Invocation of Angels by Brother Franz Joseph Haydn

2009-04-26T15:37:00.000-07:00

As in Mozart's The Magic Flute , there is a possible Masonic subtext in The Creation . Like Mozart, Haydn was a Freemason. Freemasonry (another English institution) promoted, among other things, the brotherhood of all men, viewed God as the supreme architect, and prized an enlightened mind. Such ideals persisted in Vienna despite Emperor Francis II's 1795 edict forbidding further lodge meetings. Masonic themes such as a loving admiration for God's newly created world, a high regard for mankind, and the opposition between darkness (Chaos; evil; ignorance) and light (order; good; understanding) -- an element of the Masonic initiation rite -- occur repeatedly in The Creation . Although Haydn never acknowledged a Masonic agenda for the work, many nineteenth-century performances of The Creation were actually benefits for various Masonic lodges

Retrieved on April 26, 2009 from the Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

Graduation Time

2009-04-26T10:14:00.000-07:00

Rutgers University Commencements are upon us!

Congratulations to the graduates and their families. The university’s 243rd Anniversary Commencement ceremony will be held on Wednesday, May 20, 2009, at 1:30 p.m. on Voorhees Mall. University Commencement is a universitywide ceremony at which the president of the university formally confers all undergraduate and graduate degrees awarded throughout the past academic year.
Separate convocations are also held by most of the individual schools and colleges at various times from Sunday, May 17, through Friday, May 22, at which degrees and awards are distributed to the schools’ graduating classes.

Scarlet Knights Philosophy Cafe

2009-04-24T13:13:00.000-07:00

As a throwback to the days of coffee shop poetry guilds & the Salon d' Rose Croix movement of Sar Peladan, Rutgers University's Rutgers Day Festivities will feature a Philosopher's Cafe on College Avenue this Saturday Afternoon. I hope to run into some like minded students and alumni while partaking in two of my long standing loves: fine coffee & philosophic arts.

Incidentally, the photo to the right was taken in a coffee house in Alexandria, Virginia & features a fellow young Mason & Academic in his regalia.

Academia & Freemasonry

2009-01-13T10:31:00.000-08:00

I recall the first time that I noticed the collar of office on the Dean and President at a University procession. The collars in this case are based upon the peerage and mayoral collars of Europe, or more correctly upon the chains worn by high officials of the various heraldic & religious orders of nobility. I recall how striking it was to see the collar over a dark robe with a doctoral cap. At the time, I started to wonder if this was some sort of blatant connection to Freemasonry. Mace bearers in academic processions are identical to the Masonic Marshal with sash and baton, and they also remind me a bit of Deacons in the lodge, and deacons in the lodge (who originally used the dove of the Holy Spirit as their emblem on their rods) are entirely reflective of the Deacon and Sub-Deacon in a High Mass as their movements mirror each other on opposite sides of the room. I was intrigued as an undergrad at Rutgers University's graduation ceremony to see the hooding ceremony of graduate students. This partly inspired me to pursue graduate studies myself.

Some Universities have their own masonic lodges. Both Apollo University Lodge at Oxford and Isaac Newton University Lodge at Cambridge have produced some of the most senior and prestigious members of English Craft Masonry. Apollo has existed for nearly 200 years at Oxford, with the first meeting of Apollo Lodge having been held on 10 February 1819. It was re-affirmed in 1853 that candidates must be, or have been, members of the University, though requisites allowed associated memberships at Cambridge's Isaac Newton University Lodge No. 859. A great many Universities in the UK have a Masonic lodge. Many of the lodges are for juris doctors or medical doctors and students studying to be lawyers and doctors.

Doctors are equivalent to Bishops in Academia, and there is a clerical origin to the academic regalia. Similarly, Freemasonry has roots in the church as a Trinitarian Speculative Order arising out of Operative guilds of stone masons who built the churches with disputed infusions of influence possibly stemming from various Chivalric and Religious Military Orders of Knighthood as well. I've always noted the capstones, cornerstones, arches and pillars on the old College Avenue campus of Rutgers University and others of similar antiquity. Often the pillars flanking the entrance to portions of campus are capped by spheres which serve no structural or architectural purpose and are obvious Masonic allusions. Colleges, like Masonic lodges, are founded with Charters...originally of Royal Institutional endorsement. Across campuses there are edifices in stone and marble containing sun bursts, open scrolls, torches, crossed keys, crowns, lilies and even compasses.

Interestingly, academic chairs and research centers for the study of freemasonry have now been founded at universities in Brussels, Sheffiedl, Zaragosa and California with other Institutions offering singular (and well received) courses on the matter. The Exeter University's program on the Western Mysteries does not escape attention either, as it covers Rosicrucianism, Alchemy, Masonry and other streams of Western esoterica. In the Netherlands, freemasonry is studied at the chair for Freemasonry as an intellectual current and a socio-cultural European phenomenon at the University of Leiden and as the chair for History of hermetic philosophy and related currents at the University of AMsterdam. Both of these Universities are conveniently located near the archives of the Grand East of the Netherlands in the Cultural Masonic Center in The Hague and the Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica in Amsterdam. There is a great deal of stimulation of interest in the fields of history, art history, anthropology, literature, political science, sociology and religious studies with regards to Freemasonry as an academic subject of influence upon societal culture.

Brothers Frelinghuysen

2008-11-28T13:01:00.000-08:00

Both Dumont & Frederick Theodore Frelinghuysen (US Senator & Sec. of State) were graduates of Rutgers College & prominent Freemasons. Theodore Frelinghuysen was Frederick's uncle and served as both Mayor of Newark, NJ (Frelinghuysen Avenue in Newark's South Ward is named for him) & as US Attorney General. He was also a Freemason, and he served to found Queens College, Rutgers University!

Masonic Hall in New Brunswick, New Jersey 1800's

2008-11-07T14:30:00.000-08:00

This building also contained the New Brunswick Opera House and on the ground floor was Kilmer's Pharmacy (corner of Albany & George Street. Knowing this to be just feet away from where the Grand Lodge of New Jersey was founded in the 18th Century by the Chief Justice & VP of the State of New Jersey, Army Colonels and High Sheriffs. The town always struck me as having a Masonic ambiance to it, despite the fact that it lacks currently any mainstream Masonic activity. It is a town full of lodges, be they Prince Hall Masons, or of other fraternal streams. In the winter time, one could literally visualize the Masons in top hats and overcoats walking with other gentlemen to attend lodge in this old, historic city.

Under the Royal Arch 3X3

2008-11-03T13:36:00.000-08:00

The Ambiance at Rutgers

2008-11-03T13:29:00.000-08:00

There is a very distinct, old world, ivy league feel to the College Avenue Campus of Rutgers College in New Brunswick. Some of the buildings are quite old, and there are some points of interest, including the globed pillars that flank the entrance points as well as the arches, capstones and certainly old St Peter's Cathedral with its all seeing eye in a delta enclosed by a circle within a vesca pisces amidst several patey crosses and crossed keys. This is just a few feet away from where the Grand Lodge of New Jersey was founded in town. Many famous Freemasons have come this way before, and numerous Masons have graduated from this very campus.