Lodge History

Piedmont Lodge No. 447 is a Regular Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons working under the jurisdiction of the Most Worshipful Grand Lodge of Georgia.

In the early years of the Twentieth Century, the various Masonic Bodies of Atlanta rented space at buildings all over the city. On January 7, 1902, a suitable hall, later called Concordia Hall, was found located at Forsyth and Mitchell Streets to serve as a common meeting place for all Bodies. Piedmont Lodge was organized on February 21, 1902 and operated under dispensation from Max Meyerhardt, Most Worshipful Grand Master of Masons in Georgia until November 14, 1902 when it was duly constituted a Lodge by M.W.B. Thomas H. Jeffries, Acting Grand Master. Bro. Henry M. Wood was the first Worshipful Master and also originally proposed the name of Piedmont for the Lodge. After retiring from the East, he became the Lodge's first Secretary, a station he served in for over thirty years until his death.

Growth in all Masonic Bodies necessitated their moving to a new Masonic Temple located at Peachtree and Cain Streets whose cornerstone was laid on May 8, 1907. Piedmont Lodge met in this temple for forty-one years until it was destroyed by fire on September 7, 1950. This fire not only destroyed a meeting site but it also destroyed forty-eight years of Piedmont's historical records, without which a truly complete history of the Lodge cannot be written.

Piedmont's growth and influence has, at times, been remarkable. In 1924, it was reckoned to be the second largest Lodge in Georgia with over 1200 members. Its rolls have included a past Mayor of Atlanta and many leaders of the business and professional community.

Following the disastrous fire in 1950, Piedmont Lodge met in the Temple at Kirkwood in southeast Atlanta while a new Temple was being built at 1690 Peachtree Road near Brookwood Station. Members were assessed $100 a piece to help pay for the new Temple. This was accomplished by raising dues from $7 to $35 a year for four years. As a result, Piedmont was the only Lodge that moved into the new Temple at its opening paid in full. Piedmont held its first Communication in the new Temple on the second Monday of October in 1960.

Being a downtown Lodge, Piedmont has been made up of men from all over Atlanta but so many members were employed by or retired from the telephone company that it has been called the 'Telephone' Lodge.

In recent years, the Lodge has suffered a decline in membership as have all Masonic institutions. Still, it has continued to labor to make good men better-- a task that depends not on quantity in the least for its perfection.

-- from notes compiled by W.B. Jesse C. Hartley, Jr, Lodge Historian

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