Page 164 - Cornelius Hedges Story

151 The Cornelius Hedges Story

“At home we are reaching the long-deferred prospect of a
Home around which our hopes and efforts for many years have
centered. It may be all for the best that our hopes have been
so long delayed. We shall be the better able to sustain a Home
creditably, and with every New Year there will be increased
need of such an institution. In the language of the Battle Hymn
of the Republic,” “Our God is marching on.”505
The last Communication of the Grand Lodge which Hedges
attended was the special meeting held to lay the cornerstone of the
Masonic Home in the valley near Helena on December 27, 1906.506
And at the time of his death, his Masonic brothers wrote “The
only unfinished work upon his trestle-board was the completion of
this building, marking the establishment of the institution for which
he had so ably and continuously labored.”507
In September 1907, Cornelius Hedges, Jr., speaking of his father
told the Grand Lodge:

“He was supremely happy in the thought of the completion of
the Masonic Home and referred to it constantly in his last illness. It
seems providential that he was permitted to attend the ceremonies
of laying the cornerstone.”508

In 1925 Past Grand Master William A. Clark, who had become
wealthy in the mining industry, died and bequeathed $25,000 to
the Home’s endowment fund. Invested funds at that time totaled
$69,000 and the old debt was all paid. Keeping this in perspective W.
A. Clark’s’ $25,000.00 of 1925 dollars would be worth $339,323.69
in 2015.