lodge history

The Castle Wardens Lodge, one of 191 Lodges in the Province of Northumberland, is a relatively young Lodge.The date of our warrant is 14th February 1968 and the Lodge was consecrated on 30th March 1968. Our first meeting of the Lodge was held on the 30th May 1968, and it was the first Lodge to meet within Ponteland.

The Lodge was orginally conceived by Bill Bloomfield, a Freemason who, in the mid sixties, had been moved by his company from the South of England to the North East of England, and came to live in Ponteland.

The Lodge was founded with the basic intention of bringing together brethren of the locality, irrespective of work or profession; to form a Lodge of actual neighbours with a variety of interests, rather than members with common interests.It was the firm intention always to hold the Lodge meetings in Ponteland, in what was then the Castle Ward Urban District Area.

Bill and the other fourteen founding members of the Lodge wanted to establish a small Lodge, meeting only four times a year, which would be particularly suitable for people who were away a lot on business, or worked in different places for short periods, which would make it difficult to attend a Lodge that met more frequently during the year. The Lodge has remained small, with 32 members at present, and still meets only four times a year.

The name of the Lodge derives from the name of the Urban District in which the Lodge was originally founded. The banner of the Lodge depicts a Castle with the key to the Castle underneath.

In the upper part of the banner the representation of the castle is in natural stone colour set on a green background representing the countryside in which we live and come together for our meetings.

The lower part of the banner alludes to our duty as wardens to protect the castle from attack or misuse, particularly after our Lodge meetings are closed. This is represented by a golden key set on a black background, alluding to the closed Lodge. The banner was made by Bills wife Henriette.

For the first three years of its existence the Lodge met in the hall of St Mary's Church in Ponteland (inset). The Lodge meetings were then moved to the Memorial Hall on Darras Road in Ponteland where the Lodge meetings are still held today.