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Asterism

1813

A History of Freemasons in Tennessee

Chota Lodge as the symbolic resolution

By 1856, when Chota Lodge #253 was founded, the Cherokee homeland had already been fractured by removal.

Taking on the name Chota placed a Tennessee Masonic house under the name of an older Cherokee council center. Freemasonry in Tennessee begins through men building civic order.

Chota Lodge #253 becomes a symbolic meeting point:

Iroquois influence on union thinking through Benjamin Franklin ⟦St. John’s Lodge, Philadelphia⟧
Cherokee council society on Tennessee ground
George Washington’s ⟦Fredericksburg Lodge #4⟧ federal territorial action
William Blount’s [Lodge Unknown] Knoxville and treaty-facing government
John Sevier’s ⟦Tennessee Lodge #2⟧ popular frontier legitimacy and Masonic leadership
later Masonic memory preserving the Chota name

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Knoxville becomes the Masonic center of East Tennessee

After Tennessee became a state, Knoxville remained important as both a political and Masonic center.

The city had already served as a territorial capital and as the place where William Blount had organized much of the machinery of government. It had also become the setting where John Sevier’s ⟦*⟧ public role crossed into Masonry. In 1800, Tennessee Lodge No. 2 was chartered in Knoxville, and John Sevier ⟦*⟧ was named its first Worshipful Master.

Tennessee Masonry developed in the same civic environment that produced territorial government, statehood, Indian diplomacy, and frontier leadership. The lodge did not stand outside the political culture of early Tennessee. It grew from the same network of men who were organizing towns, courts, militia service, trade, land records, churches, schools, and local government.

Knoxville therefore became more than a settlement or administrative center. It became a place where public authority and fraternal authority developed side by side.

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The Grand Lodge gives Tennessee Masonry a statewide structure

On December 27, 1813, representatives of early Tennessee lodges met in Knoxville and formed the Grand Lodge of Tennessee. Hiram Lodge No. 7’s history states that the meeting took place in the lodge room of Tennessee Lodge No. 2 and that the representatives formed the Grand Lodge from the early pioneer lodges of the state.

This changed the scale of Tennessee Masonry.

Before this point, individual lodges existed in different towns and settlements. After the formation of the Grand Lodge, Tennessee Masonry had a statewide governing body. The lodge system now had an institutional structure comparable to the state structure that had already formed around courts, counties, legislatures, and local offices.

Freemasonry was no longer only a local association of leading men. It had become part of Tennessee’s broader institutional landscape.