Goliad Lodge No. 94 A.F. & A.M.

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Goliad Lodge Number Ninety-Four. Now settle in, because this is a story about a building that has seen just about everything a Texas town can throw at it. We're talking about the Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and friend, they were not wasting any time.

On August 18, 1851, this lodge held its very first meeting. Not a temporary spot, not a borrowed room they'd vacate come morning. They meant to stay.

And sure enough, by January 24, 1852, they were chartered, official, and ready for the long haul. Their first worshipful master was A.H. Biscoe, a man whose name leads off the whole record.

Then came 1854, and up went the building. Rubble stone, set solid, the kind of construction that doesn't apologize to weather or time. And here is the part worth slowing down for.

Every single meeting this lodge has ever held has taken place inside those same walls. Not some of them. Not most of them.

All of them. That rubble stone building has been the one and only home. And the lodge wasn't even the only tenant.

For many years, the first floor housed the post office and city hall both, meaning the same walls that kept the Masons' business also handled the town's mail and the city's governing. That old building was doing the work of three institutions at once. Goliad Lodge Number Ninety-Four, A.F. and A.M., one charter, one building, and a record of continuity that most things in this world simply cannot match.

What the marker says

First met on Aug. 18, 1851. Chartered Jan. 24, 1852. First worshipful master was A.H. Biscoe. All meetings have been held in this rubble stone building since it was erected in 1854. Post office and city hall occupied the first floor for many years. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1967