DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Velasco Lodge Number Seven Fifty-Seven. Now, some organizations fade in and out of a community like a summer storm. Others dig in deep and become part of the county's very bones.
Velasco Lodge Number Seven Fifty-Seven, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, is that second kind. The Grand Lodge of Texas granted them their charter on December 8, 1893, with R. E.
Murrell serving as the first Worshipful Master. Right from the start, these men were building something meant to last. And you could tell — just one year into their existence, back in 1898, they helped establish a public library.
A public library. That tells you a lot about who these fellows were. But lasting things get tested.
The lodge's first hall sat near the mouth of the Brazos River, in the Velasco townsite, and then came 1900. That hurricane — the one that struck the Texas Gulf Coast and rewrote the map of this entire region — severely damaged that first hall. Severely.
And yet, the lodge didn't dissolve. They didn't scatter. They gathered wherever they could find a roof — a lumberyard building owned by J.
T. Dingle, the Velasco schoolhouse — meeting in one borrowed space after another for years, because the work was more important than the address. By 1911, they'd found something a little more stable, renting the Velasco Hotel's Powerhouse building from a man named E.
D. Dorchester. That arrangement held all the way through 1922, when the Freeport Sulphur Company donated land in downtown Freeport.
Now they had ground to call their own. They built a two-story hall on the corner of Broad Street and Park Avenue, and that corner served the lodge for decades — until a new facility was built at this very site in 1979. More than a century of Brazoria County history, through hurricanes and borrowed buildings and donated land, leveling cornerstones on public buildings, supporting educational activities, and making sure this community had a library before the twentieth century even got started.
That's not just an organization. That's a cornerstone itself.
What the marker says
A part of Brazoria County history for more than a century, Velasco Lodge No. 757, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, was granted a charger from the Grand Lodge of Texas on December 8, 1893. R. E. Murrell served as first Worshipful Master. The members' first lodge hall, located near the mouth of the Brazos River in the Velasco townsite, was severely damaged in the disastrous hurricane which struck the Texas Gulf Coast in 1900. The Masons met in a number of locations in the vicinity for many years, including a lumberyard building owned by J. T. Dingle and the Velasco schoolhouse. The lodge rented the Velasco Hotel's Powerhouse building from E. D. Dorchester from 1911 to 1922, when the Freeport Sulphur Company donated land in downtown Freeport. A two-story hall was built at the corner of Broad Street and Park Avenue, which served the lodge until a new facility was built at this site in 1979. Velasco Lodge has been involved in many civic and philanthropic endeavors, including the establishment of a public library in 1898, the leveling of cornerstones on public buildings, and the support of educational activities. (1994)