This excerpt of Lodge history was researched and written by W.V. Jones as follows:

To write the history of Iredell Lodge might, upon first thought be considered an easy task and one that might be completed in a very short time and the work made ready for the lodge’s use in a few days. And while it is true that only a very small space was necessary in which to record the brief sketch, it required the reading of about seven hundred pages of minutes to gather the data, and after this had been done it required still more time to weave the facts collected into a form that would make them readable. Old records had to be gone over and some of them we found to be very difficult to read because of bad penmanship, and because of the faded condition of the ink used in making the records. The lapse of forty-four years had left its foot-prints upon the pages and made them hard to decipher, and to this was added the fact that some of the recording secretaries used interlineations and abbreviations to the extent of beclouding the facts intended to be recorded, and it was sometimes hard to tell what was designed to be preserved. But we have waded through the dusky pages with reasonable care and now bring you the result, and as imperfect as the work may appear to the reader, we beg to say that with the time we have been able to devote to this work we have done the best we could, and hope you will exercise brotherly charity in your criticism of the work.

Iredell Lodge was organized under dispensation and worked by authority of a dispensation one year, and was then granted a charter, the date of which is June 16th, 1874. The first meeting of the Lodge was on Thursday, March 13th, 1873, which meeting was held under dispensation, and while the minutes do not say this was the first meeting in fact it was and was the date when the Lodge was organized and set to work. The minutes of this first meeting show that Bro. J. K. Helton occupied the East as proxy for D.D.G.M. Rose, and the following were named as present: G.W. Roberts, S.W.; W.L. Fox, J.W.; Wm. Mingus, Treasurer; S.J. Sidnell, Secretary; J.S. Hanna, S.D; J.T. Foster, J.D., pro tern; and W.B. Allen, Tiler. In addition to the names of those mentioned as officers, the names of E.H. Barcroft, N.B. Ross and G.A. Gordon appear under the head of members present, but in fact Bro. G.A. Gordon was the W.M. though his name was recorded in the list of members present, no doubt, because Bro. Helton was presiding at this first meeting as D.D.G.M..

There seems to have been no business transacted at this meeting, as the minutes only show that the Lodge was opened and the names of those present recorded, but no record is made of the Lodge having been closed, which we presume was an oversight of the Secretary. Only nine members were present at this meeting and they were charter members, but they were not all who belonged to this noble band; for at the second meeting the name of I.P. Collins appears as a member present, and at the third meeting we find the name of L.A. Ogle in the list of members present. These eleven whose names we have mentioned composed the charter members and constituted the nucleus around which the membership of Iredell Lodge was gathered. All of these brethren whom we call charter members have passed to their rewards except Bro. N.B. Ross who severed his connection with the Lodge by obtaining a demit several years ago.

G.A. Gordon was the first W.M. and G.W. Roberts the first S.W. and each of these brethren were annually elected to fill the same stations for five years in succession, at which date G.W. Roberts was elected W.M. and P.M. Conley was placed in the west. Bro. W.L. Fox, the first J.W. was kept in the south for four successive years and then dropped out not having been advanced from that station.

At the second meeting four applications were received for the Entered Apprentice degree and one for the Master’s degree. Bro. A.M. Trimble having received the first and second degrees while in the Confederate army made application at this meeting for the third degree, which was received, took the regular course and a month later he was given the degree, he being the first upon whom the Iredell Lodge conferred the third degree.

The first petition presented to the Lodge for initiation was that of E.L. Deatherage and he was the first candidate initiated into the mystery of Free Masonry by the Iredell Lodge, but this was quickly followed, and on the same night by the initiation of T.M. Tipton.

The increase in membership by initiations, passings, raisings and affiliations were rapid for a few years, notwithstanding the fact that a considerable number of applicants for the first degree were rejected during the early years of the Lodge’s history. For five years the growth and progress of the Lodge seemed, from the reading of the old records, to have been satisfactory, but at the end of the first five years misfortune came that threw a brake on the wheel for a time, which was the loss of the entire property owned by the Lodge by fire. It is generally known that the Iredell Lodge erected its first Hall in connection with a church about one mile east of town on a plat of ground for many years known as the “Old Camp Ground.” Here the Lodge Held its meetings until September 1878, being a little more than five years from the date of organization when the entire property was destroyed by fire. There being no insurance against the loss by fire this fell heavily upon the brethren coming as it did, at a time when they had hardly recovered from the financial strain of building and furnishing their hall.

The last meeting held in the old hall was September the 7th, 1878, and we may reasonably infer that the building was burned after that date in September or in the early part of October of the same year. But in this hour when the monument of their efforts lay buried in a heap of ashes, still inspired by the dauntless courage characteristic of Master builders they shouldered the burden, moved forward and soon had the wheel rolling again.

We find no account of any meeting being held from September 7th, 1878 to March 1st, 1879, which meeting was held in the Odd Fellow Hall in the old original town of Iredell. Here the Iredell Lodge held its meetings for just one year, having held the last one there on March the 1st, 1880, but on March the 20th, twenty days later, another meeting was held, and the place of  meeting was named in the minutes as the Masonic Hall, which, no doubt, was the Lodge room built in connection with the public school building erected on the site where the school building now stands.

Here the Lodge held its meetings in its own hall for thirty years, but when it was decided that a larger and more commodious school building was demanded, and to erect it on the same site, required the removal of the old building which included the Masonic Hall, it laid upon the Masonic brethren the necessity of looking out a new location for a lodge room. The tearing down of the old building forced the members of the lodge to seek a new home and the present building was purchased and the move from the old Hall was made in 1910, after the present Hall had been approved by Grand Master Walter Acker in person. And for seven years the meetings have been held in a Hall owned by the Lodge, and the growth and prosperity of the Lodge shows the wisdom of securing a place of meeting more centrally located and more in touch with the business portion of the town. A larger amount of work has been done since moving into the building now regarded as the home of the Lodge than had been done for the same length of time in the past history of the Lodge since its organization forty-four years ago. Of the hundred and fourteen who have been raised to the sublime degree of Master Mason by the Iredell Lodge since its organization, twenty-seven of that number have been raised since the Lodge moved into its present home, which constitutes nearly one-fourth of the work done in the forty-four years of its existence.

Thinking that perhaps the present membership would be glad to hear the names of the men who have passed through the ordeal of becoming Master Masons in the earlier days of the Lodge’s history, we take the liberty to record them as follows: A.M. Trimble, E.L. Deatherage, W.V. Jones, E.G. Crawford, G. W. Dacon, F. B, Jones, Henry Evans, T.M. Topton, M.S. Dotson, W.K. Holmes, Terrell Winters, C.A. Gordon, J.W. McCullough, J.M. Faggard, Marion Mills, J.E. Sellers, G. W. Tabor, Koss Barry, J.A. Chester, James Garron, R.H. Williamson, W.B. Abbott, J.C. Orr, W. B. Cannon, W.D. Lusk, J.A. Hamilton, S.B. Cranfill, R.A. Ford, O.C. Beaty, W.A. Whitlock, A.J. Say, Wm. Crow, J.C. Ford, B.F. Gleason, Wm. Bayles, J.A. Guinn, W.E. Pinnell, E.L. Deatherage, Jr., C.W. Tidwell, S.A. Perry, T.H. Green, C.N. Owens, M.B. Grace, W.H. Brashear, J.J. Durham, G.S. Thompson, G.W. Bullock, T.T. Jackson, J.P. Williamson, M.K. Martin, W.D. Schenck, W.F. Schenck, D.N. Ellis, C.H. Cain, James Berkley, J.E. Linguist, W.H. Jackson, J.G. Sadler, W.R. Davis, R.L. Kimmins, T.F. Bryan, T.H. Deatherage, J.S. Lamar, J.E. Harris, E.B. Foster, J.W. Dean, S.W. Collins, J.C. Falkner, W.J. Roden, C.D. Chaffin, J.R. Davis, W.R Langston, M.P. Frank, T.E. Thornton, A. Thornton, R.C. Newton, D.H. McMurray, I.W. Davis, M.B. Barefoot, Ed Greer, E.N. Davis, C.C. McBeath, T.W. Houston. C.A. Mitchell, J.B. Stephens, H.D. Blue, G.M. Gordon, Guy Jones, J.D. Welch, A.E. Harroun, W.H. Barton, F.C. Harris, W.C. Fouts, T.M. Ellis, W. D. Gordon. G.R. Collier, S.H. Bateman, W.R. Odom, Q.A. Fouts, J.P. Anderson, T.M. Davis, J.E. Woody, W.R. Phillips, R.S. Echols, J.J. Adams, J.D. Tidwell, M.G. Tucker, C.C. Moore, H.C. Powell, J.N. Taylor, L.M. Fields, R.W. Brannan, J.B. Hudson, and Wick Simpson.

The following are members of this Lodge by affiliation: A.L Branding, W.T. Antwine, H. Allen, J.D. Alsup, W.S. Blue, Joshua Davis, A.R. Frank, T.W. Foster, W.A. Houston, R.P. Huckaby, D.M. Kaylor, W.E. Lott, W.S. Pruett and L.O. Perdue. Of the 63 who compose the membership of the Ircdell Lodge at present these are the only ones not made Masons by this Lodge.

The Lodge has been served by the following Masters; G.A. Gordon, G.W. Roberts, P.M. Conley, C.A. Gordon, N.A. Morgan, J. Mingus, B.F. Cox, J. A. Guinn, W.H. Brashear, J.P. Williamson, W.V. Jones, C.H. Cain, T.F. Bryan, R.L. Kimmins, S.W. Collins, M.P Frank I.W. Davis, W.T. Antwine, C.A. Mitchell, J.E. Harris, and is now being served by T.M. Davis.

The longest service rendered as W.M. was by Bro. P.M. Conley, he served six years, but not in succession. C.A. Gordon and B.F. Cox each served Five years but not consecutively. Five others served two years each with the lapse of one or more years intervening, while the remaining twelve served one year each, save and except the first Master, G.A. Gordon, who served five years in succession. And we think it a fitting tribute to his memory to call attention to his faithfulness and punctuality during those five years when the Lodge was in its formative state when it took men of brawn and brain to keep the Craft afloat. During the first five years of the organization there were sixty-six meetings held, and G.A. Gordon is shown to be present at sixty-two of them, having missed only four meetings out of sixty-six, a record that rarely finds an equal in the history of men. And our estimate of the value of service rendered with such faithful punctuality may be increased when we state the fact that Brother Gordon lived three miles in the country, and that he lived at a time when the mode of travel was very different from what it is now and that Brother Gordon was more than fifty years of age when he became Master of the Lodge, and he must have ridden through cold and rain to have attended with such punctuality as he did, but at sixty-two of the sixty-six meetings referred to his gavel was heard calling the Craft to order.

But it would be recreant to Masonic principle as well as Masonic trust, if we did not mention the name of Brother G.W. Roberts who served in the West during the five years that Brother Gordon served in the East, for taking all facts into consideration he was no less faithful and punctual. During the five years Brother Roberts missed eleven meetings while Brother Gordon was absent at only four, but when we state the facts as they then existed it will throw some light on the cause why Brother Roberts was absent at more meetings than Brother Gordon. Brother Roberts was a minister of the gospel and in those earlier days he served churches as their regular pastor and his ministerial duty would sometimes carry him to other communities on lodge night. And while Brother Roberts was a true Mason at heart and delighted to attend the meetings of his lodge and enjoyed the association of his Masonic brethren, still he held religion and the church as standing above every other organization and recognized that his first duty was to God and his church. Looking at facts and conditions as they then existed, we find Brother Roberts standing in the front rank along with the most faithful.

We also beg to mention the name of P.M. Conley as one of the old armor-bearers of Iredell Lodge in the early days of its history. He served more years as Worshipful Master than any other man and did it with skill and ability, always looking to every measure proposed with an eye to the good of the order. He was peculiar in disposition, unique in expression, firm in his convictions, but was generally found on the right side of great issues involving principles of the right. As a Mason he contended for Masonic usages to be adhered to as the only safe anchor for Masonic lodges. And those associated with P.M. Conley in Masonic circles in the years gone by will not forget his work and are willing to do honor to his memory for the true Masonic life he lived.

We feel unwilling to pass the name of B.F. Cox without recording a word to his memory. He was one of the four who rendered as much as five years to the Lodge as Worshipful Master. He was somewhat on the reserve, may have been a little slow to reach a conclusion, but when he had made up his mind was firm in his convictions and nothing, but cold facts could change him. As a Mason he was not forgetful of the obligations he had taken, and his purpose was to carry them out in the spirit as well as in the letter. The service rendered to this lodge by B.F. Cox no doubt, is of greater value than we have thought, and we feel it but just and proper to erect in his memory a monument to his life.

Masonic lodges, like other organizations, have their dark days and stormy seas, and sometimes the Craft is almost hidden from view between the rolling waves, and fears are entertained that it will not again reach the summit and Iredell Lodge is not an exception to this, that is it has not been free from such misfortune. Strong as it is now and girded with chains as strong as the fundamental principles of eternal truth, still it has had its dark days and stormy seasons, and when it seemed that its armor bares would desert and leave the Craft to drift without a guide. Misunderstanding among brethren and unguarded remarks brought about a condition some years ago that threatened to add another to the list of demised lodges, but this was checked by the heroic courage of one who picked up the gavel that had been thrown down, rallied the forces and brought order out of confusion. At one time in the history of Iredell Lodge a state of affairs existed that no one, who was eligible, was willing to undertake to guide the Craft, and it looked for a while that the gavel would remain unyielded. But in this hour when something had to be done and done without delay, an hour when great issues were involved, Brother C.A. Gordon came forward and consented to undertake to preside over the body for another year, though he had held the place of  Worshipful Master several terms before and by the end of the year the forces had been rallied, interest awakened, and the Lodge rose to its feet and has since been marching steadily on.

To my mind the Iredell Lodge owes to C.A, Gordon far more than many have thought, and perhaps none of the present membership have thought much about the value of his service in the years gone by. Brother Gordon is now standing in the evening of life, his official work has been completed in the lodge, and any words of cheer or that would express appreciation of the work he has done spoken to him would throw sunshine and comfort along his pathway that points to the setting sun.

For the most part charity and love has prevailed in the lodge, but there have been times when the water was troubled and the storm raged, but we are glad to note that we have weathered the gale and today stand upon a foundation built by ingrafted principles that generates a current of brotherly love that beats back all unkind feelings among brethren and personal prejudice arising from any cause.

In going over the old records we have found that the standard was held very high and the principles and precepts of Masonry were earnestly contended for to an extent that seems to be greater than now. For violation of Masonic law and usage members were arraigned before the bar of the Lodge and required to make satisfactory explanation or suffer the penalty. It would be a great humility to say that we had lowered the standard of the teachings our principles by giving toleration to the commission of Masonic offenses that were not tolerated by our fathers, or that we will throw open our door for the entrance of that class of men that knocked in vain at the door of Iredell Lodge in the earlier days of its history, no we cannot afford to take such a position. But we may say that in the years of the world’s onward march that in a general way a more refined class of citizenship has been developed. Masonry does not attempt to take the place of religion or draw men away from their churches, but it labors to restrain men from the commission of injustice and acts of wrong. It gathers men about its altars and teaches them the great fundamental truths of God and immortality. It teaches no creeds nor forms of doctrine, but does invoke the Golden Rule, of doing unto others as we would have them to do unto us. It is divided by no lines that separates political parties or church creeds. It meets at the same altar and shakes hands with all people over the same Bible, who have sworn allegiance to our principles, and so long as we continue to do this the Craft will float proudly on until the setting of the last sun, and the Temple where the Supreme Master presides, hopes in sight and the doors are thrown open to receive all good and true Masons.

We feel that a fitting close to this sketch would be to pay a tribute to memory of these brethren who have fallen from the ranks, drop a flower upon their graves, and erect in our memories a monument of the faithful lives they lived. The angel of death has invaded the ranks of the Craft and carried away some of the most faithful and true, and we who are yet permitted to live and enjoy the fellowship of each other should not forget those who have been called to that country from whose bourne no traveler returns, and that your memories may be refreshed we record their names and date of death. We may not have the exact date in every instance but are within a day or two of it. A.M. Trimble, died August 11th, 1881; W.L. Fox, August 20th 1882; G.A. Gordon, March 13th, 1884; I.P. Collins, January 9th, 1887; A.M. Justice, February 13th, 1888; J.W. McCulIough, January 11th, 1889; W.B. Allen, December 11th, 1892; J.A. Tidwell, January 9th, 1893; B.F. Falkner, December 11th, 1896; Wm. Mingus, November 3rd, 1899; R.C. Russell, September 5th, 1902; G.W.Roberts, December 9th 1902; R.B.Harris, December 9, 1902; KM. Conley, February, 15th, 1903; Joseph Berkley, February 13th, 1903; G.W. Bullock, October 11th, 1902; J.B. Farmer, March 31st, 1904; F.C. Cunningham, July 22nd, 1906; E.L. Deatherage, Jr., July 4th, 1908; George Hamilton, April 9th, 1909; Allen Laswell, June 27th, 1909; J.J. Morris, February 25th, 1913; R.H. Williamson, January 10th, 1914; T.J. McClintock, October 11th, 1915; B.F. Cox, April 10th, 1916; J. Mingus, June 10th, 1916; W.K. Holmes, died in 1910, and J.D. Welch died in 1915, but we failed to find the month or day on which they passed away. Brother W.B. Abbott died a member of Iredell Lodge, but we were unable to find any data by which to approximate the date. Some of these brethren died in other localities, but we think all received Masonic burial by lodges in whose jurisdiction they died. All of the brethren who died here were buried with Masonic honors, and a number who died here but were members of other lodges were given Masonic burial by the Iredell Lodge.

In the passing out of these brethren we see examples of the execution of the inspired declaration, “It is appointed unto men once to die.” Death is the common lot of all but remember that it only opens the door to another state of being. Let us remember our fallen brethren, cherish their sacred memories, emulate their virtues and so live that when we are called to the great beyond, we will find the door of the eternal Temple, where the Supreme Master presides, open to receive us. So mote it be.

Iredell, Texas, June 2nd, 1917.