The New Masonic Trestleboard

This work was originally prepared by Charles W. Moore under the guidance of the controversial National Masonic Convention, held in Baltimore, Maryland in 1843, and it was first submitted to the Fraternity in that year. The general vision of the Baltimore Convention was to establish a uniform working for Masonic Ritual in the United States. A subsequent convention in 1847 actually took up the question of a general Grand Lodge for the United States. Needless to say, many Grand Lodges refused to participate, and only a few eventually adopted all or part of the ritual work as recommended by the committee and illustrated in this work. However, several Masonic policies and procedures common in the United States today may be traced back to the recommendations of these conventions. The New Masonic Trestleboard provides a rare glimpse into what an official American Rite might have looked like, had one been adopted over a century and a half ago.