Brazos Union Lodge No. 129

Brazos Union Lodge No. 129. Boonville. , Brazos Union Lodge was organized in Boonville in 1852. Four years earlier, another lodge, named Boonville Lodge No. 55, was created at Boonville and worked under a dispensation for several months before receiving a charter in January 1849 from the Grand Lodge of Texas, Ancient, Free and Accepted Masons. At this same meeting of the Grand Lodge, the name of Boonville Lodge was changed to Gillespie Lodge No. 55. Later, the Lodge moved to a community near Wheelock where many of its members lived. In 1868, Gillespie Lodge demised and surrendered its charter., On December 7, 1852, with the consent and recommendation of Gillespie Lodge No. 55, the following Masons: Harvey Mitchell, E. M. Millican, James M. Pierce, William C. Boyles, William Reed, Robert Johnson, James I. Bowman, C.C. Seale, H.R. Henry, John Fullerton, Henry Fullerton, and William Lawrence submitted a petition for a dispensation to organize a new Masonic Lodge in the town of Boonville., This petition was submitted through Francis L. Barziza, District Deputy Grand Master of the Fourth Masonic District, who granted the dispensation the same day. By virtue of this authority, the members assembled in their temporary lodge room at Boonville, opened the Lodge, and then duly elected and installed the following officers: Harvey Mitchell, Worshipful Master; Wilson Reed, Senior Warden; E.M. Millican, Junior Warden; C.C. Seale, Treasurer: Robert Johnson, Secretary; William C. Boyles, Senior Deacon, and James M. Price, Tiler. Harvey Mitchell served as Worshipful Master of the Lodge for the next three years., On December 10, 1853, the Lodge entered into a contract with Brother John Wilson for the erection of a suitable building. Wilson agreed to construct the building as soon as the material could be furnished at the lowest cost per square foot in the county, and to wait for payment until the Lodge would be able to pay him free of interest. C.N. Atwood, Robert Johnson, and J.C. Johnson were appointed as a building committee, whose duty was to draft a suitable plan for the building, make an estimate of its cost, solicit contribution, and report at each meeting., Brazos Union Lodge No. 129 was granted a charter dated the 21st day of January, 1854, after having worked under dispensation for slightly over one year. The Lodge's new building was completed by early spring, as the building committee was discharged on April 7, 1854. This first Lodge Hall at Boonville was probably no more than a one-room cabin., As a result, in less than one year, the Lodge was making plans for a larger building. At a meeting held on January 27, 1855, a building committee was appointed to audit and settle the accounts of the Secretary and Treasurer to select a suitable site for a building and to report their findings at the next regular meeting. This committee was made a standing committee at the next meeting on March 3, 1855. On April 28, 1855, a motion was approved that the building should "be placed at right angle lengthwise from the street." On September 22, 1855, it was recorded in the Lodge minutes that Brazos Union Lodge No. 129 held its meeting in their second new building., This new building, a larger two-story replacement for the one built in 1853, took the familiar form of many other Masonic Lodge buildings in early Texas. It was common for one of the first buildings in a community to be a two-story Masonic Lodge hall, which had the Lodge meeting room on the second floor, and normally included a first floor room to be used as a schoolroom on weekdays, a town meeting hall on Saturdays, and a place of worship on Sundays, In December 1855, the Lodge minutes record an approved motion that the lower room of the Lodge Hall be appropriated for the use of a school and also that of public worship., In 1866, the railroad was extended through Brazos County and located three miles west of Boonville, marking the beginning of the decline of Boonville. However, a store remained in Boonville for many years, and it is possible Brazos Union Lodge continued in Boonville as well. After the move to Bryan, it occupied three buildings on Bryan Street where the Dr Pepper Bottling works was later located. From there to Brother Bernard Sbisa's building, located in the vicinity of the I&GN Depot, and then, for a short time before the present lodge building on Maine Street was completed in 1910, the Lodge met in rooms over W.E. Saunder's Grocery on Main Street where the La Salle Hotel is now. , - Pete Normand, Librarian, Brazos Valley Masonic Library and Museum , Caption , This Lodge building, erected in 1855 at Mather Mills in Williamson County, Texas, is two hundred and fifty square feet. It is likely very similar to the initial, somewhat smaller Lodge built two years earlier at Boonville for Brazos Valley Union Lodge No. 129.