Masonic Jewel Return Cards, the long story

Squared Circle

This story begins with an entirely different topic. Having followed (to a significant degree) the Dave Ramsey Baby Steps to pay off all debts and also my mortgage, I worked on a presentation for my Lodge of Instruction regarding Financial Security.

Part of that presentation was the emphasis that when living without debt, the freed up income beyond saving for retirement/owning a home/college for children/etc and basic necessities can go to those projects that the Grand Artificer just happens to put in front of you. It gives you permission to say "Sure I can do that" and put your money where your mouth is, because you HAVE the money.

A day later, during my lunchbreak at work, I was browsing Ebay and randomly decided to see if there were any MA Masonic Jewels present. I had long known of the stories about PM jewels ending up on Ebay, and even witnessed a few of them returned to the lodges I belong to, but had never done so myself.

During that Ebay browsing, I happened upon a very special Masonic Jewel: A Past Deputy Grand Master Jewel, presented to R.W. Louis Jones in 1930 by Belmont Lodge. Belmont Lodge later merged into Simon W. Robinson Lodge, and a very good friend of mine, Wor. Kenneth Longo, was sitting as WM of that lodge that year. As I thought back to my own presentation, this was a perfect example of the Grand Architect putting a 'project' in front of me, now that I had the means to take care of it.

I reached out to the Ebay Seller and made him aware of the nature of the jewel, it's extreme sentimental value and limited 'marketplace value' beyond scrap cost, and he was very generous to sell it to me at scrap value. We even met personally to exchange the Jewel, and talked for a while about his father, who owned a jewelry business and gold smelter, who had recently passed. This jewel, along with a few others, were in his personal safe, likely sold to him by family who didn't realize the true historic value of the jewel, or that it should be returned to the lodge that gave it, so it may be passed along for future generations to wear. This jeweler had paid good money for this jewel, and instead of melting it as was his business, he protected it in his safe, even after his own passing, and through his good efforts, a brother was able to find this jewel and see it back to its proper home.

While I was deeply moved by this jeweler(who was not a brother, but did know several Masonic Brethren, so I was told), it occurred to me that his efforts, though thoughtful and inspiring, illuminated a deeper problem with Jewels getting sold by family after the passing of a brother.

Many lodges already have systems for signing documents about the Lodge retaining ownership of these Jewels, but that doesn't have any effect if a brother is not in regular contact with the lodge at the time of his death, moves out of the state, is suspended for non-payment of dues or demits, or any number of other reasons that could cause his estate to simply see this as 'one more bauble of some monetary value' and not a priceless piece of lodge history.

In thinking on this problem, the solution previously mentioned deals with asking for the jewel back after the death of the brother. I played this scenario out in my head for several weeks, and despite my best efforts, I concluded that "There was no good way to have this conversation." There was no amount of art, charisma or rhetoric of language that could obscure the fact that the conversation simplified down to:

"We grieve with you about the loss of your husband/father/brother/son/uncle/grandfather/etc, and while we do, may we please have his shiny golden jewel back?

Sounds bad, doesn't it? That's because it is. That's why this conversation is so hard to have, and why many lodge masters sometimes don't have that conversation. There's no proper time/place/moment to do this, and cold-calling doesn't feel any better. Simply put, no matter how meaningful the shared sorrow at the loss of a brother, no matter how earnest and sincere the desire to return the jewel for the enhancement of a future Past Master's connection to the history of his lodge, it still can easily come out as a materialistic request.

And that's when it hit me. The conversation was never easy to have because it was always being had by someone OTHER than the brother who held the jewel for his lifetime. Now many lodges encourage brethren to include their PM, PDDGM, etc jewels in their wills, but less than 50% of Americans even have a will, and only the most diligent will make sure to add new jewels and update that document accordingly. Furthermore, there's no way to 'prove if it was done', other than showing the will to somebody(which given the private nature of a will, is hardly a good course of action).

All previous ideas were good for legally compelling the jewel to be returned, but only the will addition made it an explicit request of the departed brother, and even then, it was done in the form of a will, a very business-like, impersonal request.

So instead, why not have a more personal request, phrased in the first person, that traveled with the jewel for all of its life, and when discovered after his death, made the explicit request, in his voice, to return the jewel to the Lodge, listing which lodge to give it to, or to the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts if it cannot be found.

If cards were made for every lodge, chapter, council, commandery, shrine and scottish right body, even if the wrong card got put in a case with the wrong jewel, at least the jewel would be presented to the body, who could then get it back to the proper body to whom the jewel belonged.

Is this a perfect solution that accounts for malice and greed? Of course not, but as my explanation about this site states, this is about not letting the perfect solution be the enemy of a good solution that hasn't been tried, or tried in a while.

My first attempt focused on using a long lasting, durable, but soft material, leather, with laser engraving for the lettering. While this worked, the amount of work to prevent leather rippling and such made the cost too high. Furthermore, those who bought some of these early attempts noted that while the card could fit into any Masonic Jewel Holding case, upon opening the case, the card could easily fall out.

After thinking about alternatives, it hit me that we already have another material used in close contact to a Masonic pocket jewel, the plastic name badge. Several sources made these badges, but the ones I had come to greatly appreciate were made by Wor. David LaPlante. In addition to using laser engraving(allowing for fine detailed lodge seals on the name badge), W.Bro. LaPlante made these name badges adjustable by using small strips of velcro to connect two plastic halves so the combined whole is 100% adjustable and fits perfectly in every depth of pocket.

We worked on sizing and it looks like a card that is 3" tall and 2.5" wide is the right balance of 'fits most masonic jewel cases' and amount of readable space. In the picture below it is attached with velcro strips(backed with adhesive) to the jewel case, enabling one card to be swapped out for another easily.

The card could also just as easily be attached to the back of the actual jewel holder that goes into the suit breast pocket, rather than on the case itself. Either way, as long as the jewel remains in its case when not in active use, upon the passing of the brother and the reviewing of his personal effects, the Jewel will be found with explicit instructions for what should be done.

The plastic is also cheaper than the leather, and much easier to set up and work with on a laser cutter,
and so instead of the $12 for leather cards, W.Bro. Laplante is able to make these Jewel Return Cards for $5.