For many years the Companions of Chapters along the Burlington Railroad tracks traveled to Siloam Commandery No. 54 in Oak Park or into one of the Chicago Commanderies to become Knights Templar. The journey was often slow and sometimes arduous, but congenial relationships enjoyed by the members were so strong that it was not until 1912 that a serious movement to form a Commandery in LaGrange took shape.

Several organizational meetings were held, mostly in the old lodge hall in LaGrange, widely known for its red carpet, , with Sir Knight Howard E. Patterson EPC of Siloam Commandery, acting as Commander, and Sir Knight George H. Murphy acting as secretary. Templars from eight nearby communities, extending from Cicero in the east to Downers Grove in the west, many of them members of far distant Commanderies, became interested and participated in the decision to take the steps necessary to form the new Commandery. Consent was obtained from the three nearest Commanderies, Joliet No. 4, Aurora No. 22, and Siloam No. 54, and a petition for dispensation to form the Commandery was submitted to Right Eminent Grand Commander Arthur N. Otman of Ottawa.

Records tell us that the name “Trinity” was proposed by SK Willis Melville, after the Commandery of the then Grand Master of the Grand Encampment, SK William B. Mellish, of Trinity Commandery No. 44 in Ohio. The coat-of-arms was designed by SK’s Arthur R. Wolfe and Robert C. Fletcher; the motto, “Jesus Hominum Salvator”, was proposed by Fletcher, it being that of South Carolina Commandery No. 1, the oldest Commandery in the United States. SK’s Joseph N. Redfern and Edward J. Rogerson were also active in all these preliminaries.

SK John F. Dore proposed that SKs Howard E. Patterson (EC 1912), Arthur R. Wolfe (EC 1913), and Robert C. Fletcher (EC 1914) be named the three principal officers in the dispensation in recognition of their hard work on the many details of preparation. SK George E. Smith became the first Treasurer, and SK Edward J. Rogerson the first Recorder.  

On July 27, 1912, dispensation was granted to form and open a Commandery of Knights Templar at LaGrange, Illinois. The first meeting was held on August 2, 1912, in the hall LaGrange Lodge No. 770 in the Sackett Building, which still stands at the southwest corner of Burlington Avenue and LaGrange Road. Six petitions were received, and the name “Trinity”, the motto, and coat-of-arms were approved by the assembled Sir Knights. It was decided to hold conclaves on the first and third Fridays, a practice which continued for some 78 years until the Commandery was moved to Downers Grove.

Trinity Commandery appeared in public for its first and only time while under dispensation at the Annual Conclave of the Grand Commandery September 18, 1912 in Peoria, marching in parade using an unlettered beauseant given to it by Siloam Commandery. The charter was granted at that Session, and Trinity Commandery No. 80 was constituted on November 5, 1912, by Right Eminent Grand Commander William Leslie Sharp with a membership of 80 Sir Knights.

Newsletters and other documents of the time show an active Commandery usually having some activity every Friday of the month. There were frequent practices, and it’s worth noting that the Orders of Red Cross and Malta are often shown as being conferred at consecutive conclaves rather than on the same night, as has been the practice for the last 25 years.

The first of many Trinity Easter Parades was held on March 23, 1913, ending with services at the newly built First Presbyterian Church in LaGrange. By then the membership had grown to 103. Trinity Commandery was represented in the Illinois Division for the first time at the Grand Encampment Triennial Meeting in Denver in 1913.

Even before Trinity Commandery was formed, the inadequacy of the facilities in the Sacket Building for the expanding Lodge and Chapter was apparent. One of the first projects of the fledgling Commandery was therefore the construction of a new Masonic Temple in LaGrange, in cooperation with LaGrange Lodge No. 770 A.F. & A.M. (1883) and LaGrange (now West Suburban) Chapter No. 207 R.A.M. (1893). A joint building committee consisting of three representatives of each organization was appointed in 1913. Within 3 months, the committee was ready to submit a plan, which was initially approved at a joint meeting of the Lodge, Chapter, and Commandery in January 1914 and finalized with several modifications aimed at reducing the total cost in February of that year.

The Chapter and Commandery purchased the original property at 66 South LaGrange Road, and soon after transferred title to the newly formed LaGrange Masonic Association. Site preparation and foundation work commenced during the summer and fall. The cornerstone was laid by Grand Master Henry T. Burnap on December 12, 1914, Trinity Commandery serving as escort for the Grand Master, accompanied by the band of Siloam Commandery No. 54. The new home of the Commandery was ready for occupancy in late 1915; the first conclave in the new asylum being held on December 3. The Temple was formally dedicated to Masonic purposes by Grand Master Ralph H. Wheeler on January 27, 1916, in the presence of some 600 members and visitors.

A short three years after the dedication of its new asylum, Trinity celebrated the election of its first Grand Commandery officer. Sir Knight John Paul Hobbs, who had just been elected Commander of Trinity in June, was elected Eminent Grand Sword Bearer in October 1919 at the Grand Conclave in Chicago, progressing to the office of Right Eminent Grand Commander in 1925.

These were prosperous times for Trinity and the fraternity in general. During the 1925-26 Templar year Trinity knighted 65 and affiliated 8 new members, while losing only 6 to dimit, suspension, or death; membership at the end of the year was 404. The 1926 Easter parade and service boasted the participation of 85 Knights. At its inspection the Commandery recorded an attendance of 134 members and 174 visiting Knights. The Commander was Sir Knight Burr Cullen Downes; Whitney Bodman Hobbs, son of the R.E.G.C., was Junior Warden and would progress to the office of Commander in 1930, the year after his father’s death.

The Sir Knights of today do not experience their fraternity in the same way as their fraters of the past. At the Grand Conclave of September 9 & 10, 1926, Trinity and its band followed a mounted escort at the head of the grand parade and pass in review of the Commanderies, which included some 26 bands and drum and bugle corps. After the review, the Sir Knights were placed in massed formation and returned to the reviewing stand. The massed band of over 600 pieces was followed by a color division of some 200 emblems. The main body of the parade comprised more than 300 rows of 25 Knights each, marching in a mass formation of well over 7000 Knights. With an estimated 50,000 spectators, it’s easy to see why the police, assisted by fire department personnel, cleared the center of town of traffic and turned off the traffic signals for the duration of the parade.

The Grand Commandery in 1926 reported over 36,000 members in 84 Commanderies. By comparison, The Grand Lodge reported over 280,000 members in over 990 Lodges, making Illinois the second largest Grand Lodge by membership in the United States (to New York), and first in number of Lodges. Total masonic membership in the United States was estimated at over 3,166,000(the latest figure available was for 1925).

The influx of Sir Knights to Peoria overwhelmed the usual guest facilities. Knights filled the hotels and boarding houses. Many found rooms in private homes arranged for in advance by the housing committee, while others camped in various locations around town. As had been the case for many years and would continue to be the practice for at least another couple of decades, many Knights arrived on special trains which were parked on sidings, providing not only transportation, but a home away from home for the duration of the conclave.

Most Knights attending the Grand Conclave festivities were not members of Grand Commandery and did not attend meetings. Their days were filled with parades, drill competitions, concerts provided by the Commandery bands, and other entertainments arranged by various committees, including banquets, dances , and sight-seeing expeditions.

For some years now, Illinois has had only one active drill corps, that of Austin Commandery No. 84 in Glenview. In 1926, drill competition was a major part of Templar events, and Sir Knight Hobbs presided over drill competition in three classes. Class A included Commanderies with memberships of 1000 or more (there were 9 in Illinois, 2 of which were over 2000), Class B included Commanderies of 500 – 999 (there were 12), Class C was for Commanderies of under 500 Knights.
Class A Commanderies were required to furnish a minimum of 3 battalions of 31 Knights each for field competition, while B and C teams required only one battalion. Participation in Grand Commandery drill competition in 1926 exceeded that of the Grand Encampment in recent years.
 
It is interesting to note that Trinity Commandery was chartered in Peoria, and both of the Grand Commanders who have come out of Trinity Commandery held their Grand Conclaves in Peoria.
 
Trinity Commandery continued to grow, reaching its peak membership in the late 1930’s. The Great Depression eventually took its toll, however, and membership declined rapidly until after WW2, when growth resumed. The good years continued thru the 50’s into the late 60’s, at which point there was something of a lull in activity until the late 70’s. There have been ups and downs since that time, but in its 85th year, Trinity stands as one of the most active Commanderies in the State of Illinois, with many strong ritualists, and members involved in our Grand York Rite Bodies as well as the Scottish Rite and Shrine.

Trinity Commandery has numbered among its members many of the most active men in the community in civic, social, and church affairs, not only in LaGrange but in many surrounding communities. As is often the case, the names and deeds of those associated with the founding of an organization are well documented in the permanent record, but the identities of members whose contributions are essential to perpetuate the group, and help it prosper and accomplish its purpose over time, are more difficult to discern. The written record does not match the memory of those who knew them in life, but the Commandery stands as a monument to the hard work and inspiration of many of our fraters whose names we no longer recognize. We celebrate and honor our Eminent Past Commanders, but know there are many more whose names do not appear on that honored list.

 The Temple that was the focus of so much early activity is long gone now. Our newer members do not know of the fairly ornate asylum, 42 feet in width with 22 foot ceilings, extending 110 feet from the back of the balcony in the west to the back of the stage in the east. Trinity Commandery had no need for slides in the conferral of the Commandery orders, as the Temple featured a well furnished stage, and a wide hall on one side of the asylum which was used in the ceremonies as well as for additional audience seating.

The stage included scenery depicting a ruined temple, used in the Royal Arch Degree, a fancy palace backdrop for the Order of the Red Cross, and a forest scene for a hermit’s hut. Especially attractive was the Prelate’s apartment scene, having the appearance of a small chapel with the cross and crown illuminated above and behind the Prelate as though in a stained glass window. Additional scenes illustrated the empty tomb, Christ speaking to the multitude and being parted from them (including in later years a neon halo), and the final sacrifice on Calvary.

Below the asylum was the drill hall, rededicated in later years to SK Alfred Emil Koch REPGC, featuring nearly 4000 square feet of unobstructed space used for drill practice, banquets, dances, voting (the Temple was used as a polling place for many years), rummage sales, and other activities over the years. As late as the 1980’s annual inspections drew over 100 knights in uniform with dinners catered to well over 200 attendees.

Alas, the ravages of time and decreasing revenues left the building association without the means to properly maintain the building. Enough to say that in the mid 1980’s rental revenues had fallen to $12,000 per year for a building of some 18,000 square feet. The Temple was sold in 1987; the last Commandery meetings and inspection were in early 1988. Following a brief sojourn in a temporary asylum at 33 South LaGrange Road, the Commandery moved its charter to Grove Masonic Temple, 923 Curtiss Street in Downers Grove in 1990, accompanied by West Suburban Chapter No. 207 and West Suburban Council No. 103, which had come to LaGrange in the 1950’s.

In 2016 Trinity moved once again to its current home in Naperville to compliment the York Rite bodies already there, Euclid Lodge No. 65, Euclid Chapter No. 13, and Adoniram Council No. 95 where it has started to thrive again with a renewed vigor.