Here’s a look back at the Mount Vernon Masons Parade, circa 1910

MOUNT VERNON — It’s interesting to compare today and the past. Often, we find situations where people are doing the same things now as they’ve always done, and the past doesn’t seem so distant. 

At other times, there are changes that make the past seem like another world.

In this photograph from the Knox Time group on Facebook, we see a parade held by a Masonic fraternity. The posting identifies the photo as being from around 1910, though I wonder if it isn’t a bit older.

Granted, automobiles were slow to become widespread in Knox County, but for a parade taking place on West High Street in 1910, I would have thought at least one might be visible. 

What we instead see are many horses and buggies.

The dresses/skirts of the women seen on the sidewalks in the picture are very full and long, perhaps suggesting a slightly earlier date.

My impression is that women’s skirts had become a little more straight-cut and slightly shorter by around 1910, so I’d guess these outfits are closer to 1900, though I’m admittedly no expert. 

On the far right, a woman appears to be sitting on top of the roof of a building in order to get a good view of the parade. Alas, the photo resolution is not sharp enough to bring the store signs in focus along the street.

The Masons’ hats are what is known as a bicorn hat, and the plumes were typically made out of ostrich feathers. Surviving examples of these dress hats go today on collectors’ sites for over $1,500.

Most likely, very few survived until modern times in good condition, thanks to both the fragility of the hat and the gradual decline in membership. 

It’s remarkable what a change a century can bring. Almost every town in the United States boasted multiple social groups similar to the Masons, including the Knights of Columbus, the Knights of Pythian, the Oddfellows Lodge, and more, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

In those days, such organizations were very popular, and were a convenient source of social life and entertainment. Today, when so much of our socializing happens virtually, social clubs and fraternities have seen steep drops in enrollment. 

The huge and once very busy Masonic Auditorium in Cleveland was converted into a concert venue a few years ago, because the Masons no longer needed it.

I attended a concert of the rock group Violent Femmes there earlier this year, and was amazed at the size of the ornate hall, the largest of several halls within the building. 

The Cleveland Orchestra used to record large symphonic pieces there, because the spacious hall could accommodate expanded forces better than the orchestra’s own home,

Severance Hall! I believe I heard that the large Masonic complex on Lexington Avenue in Mansfield was recently sold to developers.

The days may never return when you’d see a phalanx of Masons marching in their own parade like in this photo, but such organizations are still around and make themselves known in various local parades and through charitable activities.

I was invited, once, to join one of these groups, but I keep so busy researching and writing, I never had the time to consider it.

If I got to wear one of those hats, though …