Maplewood’s Masonic Lodge by William Ittner

It’s always a sad day when a fine building, one built to last, is demolished due to a changing economic scene.  It’s doubly sad when the building was designed by the renowned William B. Ittner of St. Louis.  It’s triply sad when the building is one of Maplewood’s finest.  The Maplewood Masonic Lodge was just such a building.

Mr. Ittner whose mindboggling career makes a fascinating study was nationally recognized for his school architecture.  Additionally he was a thirty-third degree Mason.  Two of his other well-known local buildings are the Continental Life building on Grand and the Maplewood-Richmond Heights High School.

My own recordkeeping, namely writing on the backs of these photos I took of the demolition, puts the demise of this beautiful building in 1984.  An alert soul in the community has suggested that the demolition year may not be correct.  If 1984 is not correct, I’d bet it's close.

 Regardless of when it came down, we lost a good one.  I remember a conversation I had with Maplewood architect Andy Kusnierkiewicz at the time.  He told me he had spoken with some of the remaining members of the Lodge many of whom were older.  They simply couldn’t afford to keep the building any longer.

The property was sold and a Shoney’s restaurant was built on the site.  Unfortunately Shoney’s employed an easy-to-forget disposable form of modern architecture that many businesses favor these days.  Indeed it has recently been disposed of and replaced by a CVS Pharmacy building.

The building housing the Maplewood Masonic Lodge was an important part of our architectural landscape from 1924 until 1984 (or thereabout).  Let's hope that we've learned enough since then not to let any more of our most important buildings slip away.