Wentworth Lodge in Stoney Creek

I fortunately arrived in Stoney Creek early for a Dedication Ceremony (certainly not something we Masons see often, and therefore certainly not something many of us get to participate in - and hence when the ceremony began with the opening of Grand Lodge, a lot of GLOs past and present were there) and was able to take a picture of the empty - beautiful - new lodge room before many brethren arrived to fill it up. The hall is located within a now re-purposed church, and last year the brethren of Wentworth 166 had approached administrators for the church, as the entire building was up for sale, to rent this older apparently un-used portion of the church adjacent to the new church - yet all under one roof; definitely a win-win situation.
On March 21, 2006 Wentworth Lodge No. 166 amalgamated with T. H. Simpson Lodge No. 692. During the life of Wentworth Lodge, it has had 6 homes previously, with the most recent being at the corner of Dawson Street and Passmore Avenue in Stoney Creek. The ceremony went as planned, per the official booklet printed in 1947, and I was honoured to present the Grand Master with the requisite wine to be then poured upon the floor, to assure joy and cheerfulness, in accordance with our traditions. After the ceremony, I left the lodge and assisted to close Grand Lodge, before enjoying a Grumpy Past Master and heading back down the highway.

On their website, it says "in the year 1864, a few Masons met at Wilson’s Hotel in the hamlet of Stoney Creek and decided to form a Masonic Lodge. According to the first minute records available, they met in pursuance to a notice from the Worshipful Master-elect in Wilson’s Hotel on July 14th, 1864, for the purpose of receiving the Warrant of Constitution ordered by the Grand Lodge of Canada at its Annual Sessions and for the Institution of the officers named in the said warrant, and for transactions of other business, as may be brought regularly before the Lodge, on Monday, the 15th day of August, 1864 at Stoney Creek Canada West. 

The furniture consisted of one bar room chair for the Master and an empty box upholstered on the top with a board placed thereon, for the brethren to sit on. The first gavels were turned on James Lee’s lathe in his shop, by Abraham Wilson. The pedestals were made by the late W. Bro. Horace A. Combs. The rough ashlars and the perfect ashlars were made by Thomas Russell, but were later discarded for the ones now in use.

The first Worshipful Master was Dr. Walter McKay, originally from Brantford, Ontario. Dr. McKay obtained his degree in medicine, M.D., C.W. at McGill University in 1854.

In 1901, a Committee in Wentworth Lodge met with Union Lodge to arrange a boundary line. However it wasn’t until 1924 that the actual boundary was established."

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