Resplendent Red Room is highlight of tour of 117 year old Masonic Temple.
Old Masonic Temple Getting Inside Spruce-Up as Preservation Plans Proceed
Historic Building Renovations Get Impetus from Bay Arts, Joppa Lodge
March 28, 2010
By: Dave Rogers
The Bay City Masonic Temple is slowly getting necessary renovations, some of them from the former owners, Joppa Lodge of the Free and Accepted Order of Masons.
After the Masons sold the building five years ago to the Bay Arts Council, they began meeting in the West Side Masonic Temple. After a few months, members decided to return to their old quarters, so they leased space in the old building and began to meet there again.
A visit to the "Red Room," one of several large, elaborate meeting and ritual rooms in the temple, is like a trip back in time.
Bill Gregory, right, explains needed renovations to old Masonic Temple to group touring the building last Saturday.
(MyBayCity Photo by Dave Rogers)
Joppa Lodge members and other volunteers have redecorated the room, complete with the striking Masonic symbol on the back wall of a small theatre. Chairs and benches in brilliant crimson upholstery appear as good as new.
A Mason from the 1890s entering the room would think nothing had changed. The 1893 building, burned extensively in the interior, was restored in 1903 to its present state, although the resplendent onion domes are gone.
Don Baker, secretary the 200-member lodge and controller of the building association, says a small group of members did most of the work, along with Joy Butler, executive director of the Bay Arts Council, Delta College construction technology students, and other volunteers.
Masonic members involved in the renovations included Bill Fournier Jr., Jeff Grames, Bill Moore and Matt Phillips, who did the artistic restoration of the Masonic square and compass on the back wall.
Applications have been submitted for several grants to redo the foundation, install an elevator and make other improvements. The women's bathroom has been renovated and made handicap accessible and plans are to do the same to the mens bathroom on the lower level.
A group of Masons including Baker, Fournier, Grames and Bill Gregory toured the building last Saturday with Eric Jylha of the Bay Arts Council, Alan Flood, local historian, and Dr. Steven Ingersoll, who is restoring several buildings in the city.
"One way or another this building has to be preserved for the community," exclaimed Dr. Ingersoll.
That was the consensus of the group which was enthusiastic about the future of the city's historic buildings and the important part they play in both tourism and the heritage aspect of city life.
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