Masonic Hall reveals some of its earlier past
Plumbers Chris Udell, left, and Barry Cashman stand alongside Barry’s lodge cartoon, one of a dozen hanging in the hall today that were done of successive lodge masters for the Annual Lodge Ball held in Nelson. Photo: Gerard Hindmarsh.
Plumber Chris Udell found some interesting early Takaka town memorabilia while working in the roof cavity of the Golden Bay Masonic Lodge recently.
Chris, a lodge member himself, was fixing a few leaks in what used to be the tin-lined projection booth of the former cinema building when he came across some old tickets, a film-can address tag addressed to Mr Canning, a small poster advertising the building’s grand opening back in the mid-1920s and some old glass slides, all tucked into a wall. When he inspected the attic above what is now the main hall used by the lodge members and two fitness classes, Chris also found a container of empty Harlequin Confetti boxes next to one of the latticed ceiling vents.
Lodge historian and past Master, Barry Cashman, says the vents used to be stocked with confetti prior to a wedding and a pull on a string made it drop over the assembled reception below.
“The film tag Chris found up in the projection room would have been for Scotty Canning, a local plumber who also did the job of projectionist.”
In his reminiscences about Takaka township, Those Were the Days, local historian Norrie Wadsworth explains how the theatre became established after “a Mr E. Norden” arrived in Takaka in the early 1920s with the aim of establishing a second movie theatre in the town. The first was the New Theatre, in the building the Wholemeal Café occupies today.
The Takaka Town Board, however, refused Norden permission to build a second theatre anywhere within the town. Not to be outdone, he purchased a section from farmer Laurie Reilly, just a few steps over the town boundary. Norden then successfully applied to the Golden Bay County Council, whose wider jurisdiction the land came under, and the big and lofty Everybody’s Theatre was built, along with a wooden bridgeway that connected it to Commercial Street over the flood hollow.
The opening Monster Plain and Fancy Dress Carnival Ball on Friday, 17 Sept c1928 was billed as “Absolutely the Greatest Joy Carnival ever offered the public of Takaka”. It promised numerous novelties, streamers, balloons and confetti. The event also boasted “novelty lights”, music by the entire Nelson Empire Orchestra, featuring xylophone and bell solos by the acclaimed Grant Borman.
The opening may have gone off in grand style, but the reality for the venture was that it struggled for many years and eventually had to shut down. Its narrow bridgeway continued to provide access to the then rugby football field located just beyond the hall. For a year or two, the hall reopened as a shooting gallery. The only reminder of that activity in modern times was in the main hall (just in front of the stage), where a strip of pellet-damaged floorboards had to be replaced in front of where the targets would have been.
In October 1937, the Golden Bay Masonic Lodge (2194 EC), established here since June 1887, purchased the disused Everybody’s Theatre, plus all its chattels thrown in for an additional £10, so local members could move to bigger premises. Their original lodge was across the road, squeezed in between Kirk & Co grocers and Mrs Byrne’s butcher’s shop on the corner, roughly occupying the space the Mobil office uses now.
When St Cuthbert’s Lodge (No 144) in Collingwood (previously on the site of the Fire Station) merged with the lodge in Takaka in 1972, the amalgamation celebration had to be held down at the larger high school hall because of the number of Freemasons who attended from near and afar.
Today the Golden Bay Lodge has around 30 members, with about 12 actively involved in the meetings held on the second Monday of each month. These events are often attended by Freemasons from elsewhere. Chris Udell joined the lodge around four years ago and says he sees the organisation like a “Lions Club with ritual”.
“My family had a lot of involvement, like my grandfather who was a Freemason in Christchurch; even my parents got married in a Freemasons’ Hall.”
Members here today involve themselves in charitable works. Last year they donated an electric bed to the Joan Whiting Rest Home and this year two oxygen machines to the GB Community Hospital. They also help to support the elderly and widows of past members, and student initiatives such as fundraising for Spirit of Adventure trips.
Membership of the 273 operating lodges in New Zealand today totals around 12,000. All members are men, although families are encouraged to participate socially. Freemasonry is thought to have developed among the ritualistic stonemasons of medieval Europe. In New Zealand, the first meeting of Freemasons was held at Port Levy in 1837, and the first lodge was founded in 1842. Today, the inner workings of a typical lodge temple—its layout still based around the court of King Solomon—can be seen online on the Freemasons’ website (www.freemasons.co.nz).
But don’t expect to get a look into the inner sanctum of your local lodge unless you are a member. Comments Barry Cashman, a lodge member for 52 years: “Freemasonry is not a secret society, but it is a society with secrets, where confidentiality is respected.”
Gerard Hindmarsh
