The North Carolina Mason

Borgnine, about to introduce him to me. I quickly stood, shook his hand and said, "Brother Ernest." He looked at my hand and smiled that wonderful smile, knowing that we were Brothers. We had a lengthy conversation about many things, especially our concern for our diminishing numbers in Freemasonry. I am so very thankful to have so many Brothers worldwide, when I once thought I had none. Brother Rippy is an accomplished actor who has appeared in numerous film and TV productions such as The Patriot; The Alamo; Saving Grace; Deadwood; Firestarter; The Color Purple; Maximum Overdrive; Universal Soldier; Walker, Texas Ranger; Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil; Alcatraz; and Eight- Legged Freaks. And, he continues to pursue his passion of racing vintage go-karts. Robbins Appointed Assistant to Grand Secretary By Beth Grace, NCMF Communications Director Matthew Robbins, the Grand Lodge's Outreach Program Coordinator and Administrative Assistant, has been appointed assistant to Grand Secretary Jonathan Underwood. WB Robbins has led the Grand Lodge's successful Outreach Program, which is designed to help lodges seeking to repair and rebuild their buildings, since 2022. He has also created numerous historic displays on view for all visitors to the Grand Lodge. He will continue to handle those duties, in addition to assisting RW Underwood in all his extensive duties as Grand Secretary. That includes developing a deep knowledge and understanding of The Code. All 413 pages of it. "I have many goals in this work," Robbins says. "One of those is to become intimately acquainted with the Code, to be able to quote chapter and verse without looking it up." A native of Winston-Salem, Robbins was raised as a Master Mason in 2008 and is a member of State College #770. He holds a B.A. in Communication Media and one in Arts Studies, and a Master's in Architecture, all from NC State University. He will continue his work in Outreach, assisting lodges working hard to maintain and improve the buildings in which they meet. He can help with all the preliminary work needed to create a plan to fund and to carry out a lodge renovation program. He currently is working with four lodges on such plans. Another project on the horizon is a campaign to raise funds to install a state-of-the-art library shelving system to preserve precious historical documents in the Grand Lodge's care. Maintaining Grand Lodge archives is part of the work an assistant to a Grand Secretary does. To that end, he has been working to find a way to install shelving that is critical to protecting delicate, one-of-a-kind documents from North Carolina's lodges. He spotted the exact sort of shelving the Grand Lodge needs while visiting the archives at the Masonic Home for Children at Oxford. The shelves are non-combustible and will preserve darkness for files in archival folders, preventing fading. Among the treasures that will be stored are the minutes from Unanimity Lodge's stated communication at Hornblow's Tavern in Edenton on July 4, 1776, copies of the Bahnson Manual from virtually every era since Masonry began in North Carolina, and OSWs from our history will be stored in the new shelving. Original, handwritten membership cards from our early years will live on in the shelves as well. (Thanks to brethren from all over the state, those cards have been entered into our digital databases, but the originals will be preserved.) The Grand Lodge and the North Carolina Masonic Foundation will work together to secure the funding from private donors. SUMMER 2 0 2 2 | 21

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