For your Electronic Trestle Board contact RW Randy Burleigh at
randall.burleigh@navy.mil  Give him your email address

Spring is here.  My favorite time of year.  Everything is coming to life the beginning of a new season.  First I would like to congratulate the officers on a job well done on the E.A. degree last month.  Good job guys.  You deserve a standing ovation.  Wor Adam Hunnewell gave a talk about a past master of York Lodge, referred to as the Father of York Lodge. Outstanding job.  Very interesting.  I can't wait til the May stated meeting.  Don't miss it.  I am real thankful that I have brothers that will take a part on a moments notice.  I am so proud of York Lodge.  We have an extremely busy month ahead of us.
May 1st is the spaghetti supper for project graduation there will be servings at 4pm 5pm and 6pm.  Bring your family, friends and a good appetite.  All You Can Eat.  May 8th will be our Second Saturday Breakfast.  Who knows what delicious Top Secret Family Recipe will be served.  May 15 will be our scheduled work day. With a lunch provided at noon. Looking forward to a great turnout. This year is going just great. Come see your officer’s work the degrees participate in the fellowship and enjoy the camaraderie.
 Gentlemen this is a lodge doing great things.  The momentum is building and I hope we don't get stopped for speeding.

Fraternally

Wor. Ray Brown

 Perhaps no Masonic symbol is so well and universally understood as the remorseless scythe of time. To those who contend that all our symbols are derived from the working tools of operative Masons, however, the appearance of this implement of agriculture upon the trestle board, must seem curious. A consideration of its origin therefore may throw some light upon the antiquity of its meaning and the antiquity of Freemasonry.
 Anciently a circle denoted an unending duration of time-if we may use such an expression. That is eternity. When the early observers of natural phenomena has reached that degree of enlightenment wherein they divided the year into four seasons controlled by the sun, the circle was used to designate the division by having inscribed in it the cross of the four cardinal points, thus making each quarter of a circle represent a season. Hence our name of square from the Latin ex-quadre.
 By placing around the rim of the circle the signs for constellations and planets dominant in the season whose square they were in, the zodiac wad represented. The earliest form of the zodiacal circle was broken at the four points where intersected by the cross, forming a circular figure composed of four hooks radiating from the sun which constituted the central figure of the symbol. In other words, a circular swastika sign was made, in which each season was represented as a hook, or scythe, carried by the sun, which was therefore emblematic of Time which mows down the seasons.
 Later zodiacs were not so simple, because astronomy added many details not known to the first inventors, and the unbroken circle was used. The allusion to the swastika was not forgotten, however, as its similarity to the sickle or scythe or agriculture made it readily understandable to the uninitiated. The growth of mythology and the endeavor of the priesthood to assimilate the legends of all peoples into the Masonic “monitorial” explanations of the symbols, caused Time to be personified and regarded by the profane as a god. Among the Greeks he was called Chronos and among the Romans, Saturn. He was always represented as carrying a scythe, which has been called the “Hook of Saturn.”
 Among the Hindus the planets were all represented by varying combinations of the cross and the circle. The circle of the sun was a complete circle and the circle of the moon was a crescent. Remembering the ancient uses of a hook or scythe to represent Time or the planet we know as Saturn, which was emblematic or a symbol of time, the Hindu astronomical sign of the planet Saturn was a crescent moon surmounted by a cross. The western astronomers simplified this by making one figure of it, similar to the figure 5, and this is the sign of Saturn we use today.
 We therefore see in the Scythe of Time an allegorical allusion to Deity as the God of Time, of the year, the day, the month, controlling all mundane affairs from the heavens. The introduction of the symbol under its present name marks an early era in the history of mankind, for it signifies a certain progress in astronomy, the last of the sciences, and a peaceful, agricultural people.