Quatuor Coronati Lodge: Next Meeting
Quatuor Coronati Lodge meets five times a year on the second Thursday in November (Installation); third Thursday in February; second Thursday in May; fourth Thursday in June; and second Thursday in September. Lodge meetings are usually held at Freemasons’ Hall, Great Queen Street, London.
Thursday, 8 November 2018 at 4.00 pm
The Installation of the Worshipful Master
‘Over the Hills and Far Away’ – Irish and Antients Freemasonry in Eighteenth-Century America
– Installation Paper –
The influence of the Irish in America is today identified with the more than four million Southern Irish immigrants, mainly Catholic, who dominated nineteenth and twentieth-century migration. But the pattern in the eighteenth-century was different – and fundamentally so.
Ric Berman’s paper tracks the impact of the more than 300,000 ‘Scots-Irish’ and ‘London Irish’ who sailed for America between 1720 and 1800. They gravitated towards specific regions, especially Pennsylvania, and North & South Carolina, and were instrumental in introducing Antients Freemasonry. Their lodges mark the westward development of the American frontier and laid the foundations of modern American freemasonry.
Dr Ric Berman
Ric is a PM of the Marquis of Dalhousie Lodge, No. 1159, and Temple of Athene Lodge, No. 9541, the research lodge for the Province of Middlesex. A freemason for over forty years, he holds Senior London and Provincial Grand Rank, and is a member of the Council of Trustees of the Library and Museum of Freemasonry.
Dr Berman has written six books, including The Foundations of Modern Freemasonry, which explores the political, philosophical and religious influences at the heart of eighteenth-century freemasonry; Schism, a study of the social origins of Antients Freemasonry; Loyalists & Malcontents, a history of freemasonry in Georgia and South Carolina; Espionage, Diplomacy and the Lodge, a reflection on the influence of Charles Delafaye; and From Roanoke to Raleigh, a history of North Carolina freemasonry. His 2016 Prestonian Lecture, Foundations: new light on the formation and early years of the Grand Lodge of England, marks and sets a context for the 300th anniversary of the formation of the first Grand Lodge.
Ric holds a Masters in Economics from the University of Cambridge, a Doctorate in History from the University of Exeter, and is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. He is currently a Visiting Research Fellow at Oxford Brookes University and has published research in both academic and masonic journals. A popular speaker, Ric has delivered plenary lectures at masonic and academic conferences and symposia across the UK, Europe, the USA, Latin America, Australia and New Zealand.
The Summons for the November lodge meeting can be downloaded here.
We encourage visitors to stay to dine and chat informally with the speaker and members of the lodge.
Please click here for details.
