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Excerpts from “In Harmony and Love”.
Historical Highlights of Patmos Lodge at 175 by S. Brent Morris, PM
For almost two hundred years in Ellicott City, Maryland, Patmos Lodge No. 70 has proudly maintained the traditions of the ancient, honorable fraternity of free and accepted masons. A review of its minutes shows names familiar to anyone from Howard County: Clark, Talbott, Dorsey, Snowden, Mayfield, Gambrill, Sykes, Peddicord, Pfeifer, Rogers, Worthington, Easton, Witzke, Tyson, and Long.
Historical Highlights of Patmos Lodge at 175 by S. Brent Morris, PM
For almost two hundred years in Ellicott City, Maryland, Patmos Lodge No. 70 has proudly maintained the traditions of the ancient, honorable fraternity of free and accepted masons. A review of its minutes shows names familiar to anyone from Howard County: Clark, Talbott, Dorsey, Snowden, Mayfield, Gambrill, Sykes, Peddicord, Pfeifer, Rogers, Worthington, Easton, Witzke, Tyson, and Long.
The Early Years
On February 2, 1822, Grand Master William Henry Winder granted a dispensation to Patmos Lodge which had been organized in Catonsville. “The dispensation, return and proceedings of Patmos Lodge” were examined by a committee at the next Grand Lodge session, and on May 6, 1822, they recommended a warrant be issued to the lodge. The Grand Lodge also “Resolved, that the privilege be given in the Charter … to sit alternately at Catonsville and Ellicott’s Upper Mills, if said Lodge shall deem it expedient to do so.” J. E. Jackson was appointed to install the Master of Patmos Lodge.
The charter for Patmos Lodge No. 70 was granted on May 22, 1822, and named George Timanus as Master, Reuben M. Dorsey as Senior Warden, and Andrew Smith as Junior Warden. These original officers came from Temple Lodge No. 26, Cassia Lodge No. 45, and Concordia Lodge No. 13, respectively.
There are no records accounting for the name “Patmos,” but there is a straightforward explanation. The patron saints of Freemasonry are St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist. The final book of the New Testament is the Revelation of St. John the Divine, and St. John the Divine is often confused with St. John the Evangelist. The book of Revelation was written while St. John the Divine was a prisoner in the Roman penal colony on the isle of Patmos. Thus there is a strong, if incorrect, connection between the name Patmos and one of masonry’s patron saints.
Albert G. Mackey took notice of this name in his famous Encyclopedia of Freemasonry in the article on “Names of Lodges.” Mackey did not like geographic names for Lodges but approved of “Patmos,” though he too confused St. John the Evangelist with St. John the Divine. “There are, however, some geographical names which are admissible, and, indeed, highly appropriate.… Patmos, which is the name of a Lodge in Maryland, seems, as the long residence of one of the patrons of the Order, to be unobjectionable.”
The next year Patmos had fifteen members and became a “Moon Lodge” and on May 4, 1823, they began alternating meetings between Ellicott’s Upper Mills (now Ellicott City) and Catonsville, and the meetings were held “every Saturday preceding the full of the moon.” This is presumably so members would have light to see their way home after meetings. In May 1824 the meeting date was changed to “the Tuesday in each month previous to or on which the Moon is full.” Membership had risen to twenty-four. In 1825 the meeting place was fixed at Ellicott’s Mills, where it remained until 1997.
On February 2, 1822, Grand Master William Henry Winder granted a dispensation to Patmos Lodge which had been organized in Catonsville. “The dispensation, return and proceedings of Patmos Lodge” were examined by a committee at the next Grand Lodge session, and on May 6, 1822, they recommended a warrant be issued to the lodge. The Grand Lodge also “Resolved, that the privilege be given in the Charter … to sit alternately at Catonsville and Ellicott’s Upper Mills, if said Lodge shall deem it expedient to do so.” J. E. Jackson was appointed to install the Master of Patmos Lodge.
The charter for Patmos Lodge No. 70 was granted on May 22, 1822, and named George Timanus as Master, Reuben M. Dorsey as Senior Warden, and Andrew Smith as Junior Warden. These original officers came from Temple Lodge No. 26, Cassia Lodge No. 45, and Concordia Lodge No. 13, respectively.
There are no records accounting for the name “Patmos,” but there is a straightforward explanation. The patron saints of Freemasonry are St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist. The final book of the New Testament is the Revelation of St. John the Divine, and St. John the Divine is often confused with St. John the Evangelist. The book of Revelation was written while St. John the Divine was a prisoner in the Roman penal colony on the isle of Patmos. Thus there is a strong, if incorrect, connection between the name Patmos and one of masonry’s patron saints.
Albert G. Mackey took notice of this name in his famous Encyclopedia of Freemasonry in the article on “Names of Lodges.” Mackey did not like geographic names for Lodges but approved of “Patmos,” though he too confused St. John the Evangelist with St. John the Divine. “There are, however, some geographical names which are admissible, and, indeed, highly appropriate.… Patmos, which is the name of a Lodge in Maryland, seems, as the long residence of one of the patrons of the Order, to be unobjectionable.”
The next year Patmos had fifteen members and became a “Moon Lodge” and on May 4, 1823, they began alternating meetings between Ellicott’s Upper Mills (now Ellicott City) and Catonsville, and the meetings were held “every Saturday preceding the full of the moon.” This is presumably so members would have light to see their way home after meetings. In May 1824 the meeting date was changed to “the Tuesday in each month previous to or on which the Moon is full.” Membership had risen to twenty-four. In 1825 the meeting place was fixed at Ellicott’s Mills, where it remained until 1997.