Difference between revisions of "MAGLBWales"

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(MEMORIAL)
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* [http://masonicgenealogy.com/MediaWiki/index.php?title=GMNickerson SERENO D. NICKERSON], Past Grand Master.
 
* [http://masonicgenealogy.com/MediaWiki/index.php?title=GMNickerson SERENO D. NICKERSON], Past Grand Master.
 
* [http://masonicgenealogy.com/MediaWiki/index.php?title=GMEndicott HENRY ENDICOTT], Past Grand Master.
 
* [http://masonicgenealogy.com/MediaWiki/index.php?title=GMEndicott HENRY ENDICOTT], Past Grand Master.
" [http://masonicgenealogy.com/MediaWiki/index.php?title=GMSanford BAALIS SANFORD], Past Grand Warden.
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* [http://masonicgenealogy.com/MediaWiki/index.php?title=GMSanford BAALIS SANFORD], Past Grand Warden.
 
* [http://masonicgenealogy.com/MediaWiki/index.php?title=MAGLWBurr E. WATERS BURR], Past Grand Warden.
 
* [http://masonicgenealogy.com/MediaWiki/index.php?title=MAGLWBurr E. WATERS BURR], Past Grand Warden.
 
* [http://masonicgenealogy.com/MediaWiki/index.php?title=MAGLLLovell LUCIUS W. LOVELL], Past Grand Warden.
 
* [http://masonicgenealogy.com/MediaWiki/index.php?title=MAGLLLovell LUCIUS W. LOVELL], Past Grand Warden.

Revision as of 02:17, 31 March 2011

BRADFORD L. WALES 1804-1890

Senior Grand Warden, 1857

MEMORIAL

From Proceedings, Page 1890-39

The M.W. Grand Master stated that it became his sad duty to announce to the Grand Lodge the decease, on the 13th of May last, of our venerable Bro., R.W. Bradford L. Wales, M.D., a Past Grand Warden of this Grand Lodge. His almost unvarying attendance upon our Communications during the memory of our oldest members, until within a year or two past, has made his presence and his record familiar to us all. He was one of the staunchest adherents to the Fraternity during the whole period of the anti-Masonic persecution. The sacrifices he made, and the trials he endured in the support and defence of our much-abused cause made it only the more dear to him, and made it also eminently fit and proper that wxe should place on record our appreciation of his spirit and his service. To that end W. Bro. William H. Balkam, Jr., Master of Norfolk Union Lodge, of Randolph, had been requested to prepare a suitable memorial of our deceased Brother.

Bro. Balkam thereupon presented the following :—
The committee to prepare a memorial of Dr. Bradford L. Wales submits the following report: —

Another of the few links that bind these with the early and trying days of our beloved Institution was sundered on Tuesday, May 13th, 1890,. by the passage to the Celestial Lodge above of the spirit of R.W. Bro. Bradford L. Wales. Bradford Leonard Wales was born in Randolph, Mass., May 1, 1804. He was the son of Dr. Jonathan Wales and Fanny Cobb-Wales, and the eldest of five children. He was educated at the Milton and Phillips Academies, and graduated from Middlebury College, Vermont, in 1824, at the age of twenty. He studied medicine with his father, received his medical degree at Harvard College, and was in the active practice of his profession until 1850. He married in 1831, and had one son, who survives him. As a citizen he took an earnest interest in public affairs, and filled many positions of trust and responsibility in his native town. He was elected to the State Senate in 1840, was a memberof the House of Representatives in 1853 and 1854, and was a candidate for Governor in 1854. He was a member of the Presidential conventions of 1852 and 1860, a Presidential Elector in 1852, and a member of the constitutional convention in 1853.

In 1850 he was also elected a member of the corporation of Middlebury College, and for many years was a regular attendant at the annual commencement of his Alma Mater. In religion he was a Baptist. His sixty-six years of Masonic life began during his senior year at college, when he was made a Mason. Later he became a member of Norfolk Union Lodge, Randolph, Mass., and so remained until a few years before his death. He was its Worshipful Master from June, 1829, to June, 1830, and again in 1836, 1837, 1855, and 1856. He was elected Senior Grand AVarden of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts in 1856, and was a regular attendant upon, and an earnest participant in, its Quarterly Communications until his failing strength forbade.

He was the last surviving member of the forty-two Randolph signers of the Masonic manifesto of 1831. At the age of twenty-six he carried the banner in the procession at the laying of the corner-stone of the first Masonic Temple in Boston in 1830. He was a man of the strongest convictions, and was esteemed for his strict adherence to his estimate of right. Through the gloomy days of our Masonic history he held to his principles with that tenacity which characterized him in everything, and, with that noble and devoted band, over whose signatures was published the immortal 'Declaration,' which turned the tide of public opinion in regard to our beloved Institution, he suffered social and religious ostracism, faithful to his obligations, and trusting the future for vindication. He died at the age of eighty-six years.

Thus, Brethren, one by one, are the patriarchs of our venerable Institution becoming tenants of the narrow house appointed for all the living. Silently they pass from our sight to meet the 'well done' of our Heavenly Father. Soon these scenes amid which they moved, the objects of our love and veneration, will know them no more forever. We may not be called to endure what they suffered, but, with, their shining example before us, we shall betray our trust if we do not, as they have done, leave the world better for our having lived in it.

Respectfully submitted,
W. H. BALKAM, Jr.,
Committee.

From the Proceedings, Page 1890-108, Grand Master Wells' address:

"On May 16, I being absent from the State, R.W. Deputy Grand Master Benj. A. Gould attended the funeral of our deceased Brother R.W. Bradford L. Wales, at Randolph. He was accompanied by


Distinguished Brothers