A Home for Manchester's Seniors, Built on Sixty Years of Service

To the Editor,

For thirty years, town officials, local seniors, and members of Manchester Lodge talked about turning the Masonic building at 10 Church Street into the senior center Manchester-by-the-Sea so greatly desired and needed. These discussions always fell short of action, until recently. On November 16, voters can help finish the job.

A building raised by a community
Manchester Lodge was organized in 1921 and spent four decades moving between temporary quarters. In 1962 its members formed a building committee, and in October 1963 they launched a $100,000 campaign with a fundraising thermometer on the building site. It showed $25,000 in pledges on the very first afternoon.

On May 22, 1965, the Grand Master of Masons in Massachusetts dedicated the new temple before a crowd so large that it became the first Masonic dedication ever shown on closed-circuit television.

Since then, the Lodge has tried to be a good neighbor through the Angel Fund, our Annual Holiday Dinner, high school scholarships, Music on the Park, and our annual lobster cookout. We have opened our doors to sports teams, clubs, the Boy Scouts, and the seniors, often at no charge.

A need, and an opportunity
In early 2023, with membership declining and the building being underutilized, we weighed charging rent to the groups that had long used the building for free, or selling it and meeting at the Gloucester or Ipswich Lodges.

The town's need was growing at the same time. Manchester is the only Cape Ann community without a dedicated senior center, and our population is getting older. The recent loss of the building that served as the town's community center made the need more urgent. Once word spread that the Masons and the Town were talking, seniors regularly stopped us to ask how it was going and to urge us on.

An unusual partnership
In March of 2023, representatives of the Lodge approached Greg Federspiel with an idea: the Masons would convert the building into two condominium units and sell the larger one to the Town for a senior center and overflow Town Hall offices, keeping the smaller unit as the Lodge's home.

The Select Board, the Building Association board, and a vote of the Lodge's full membership all approved. Mr. Federspiel and Select Board member Brian Sollosy represented the Town; Masonic Building Association members Rus Brown, Todd Crane, and Jim Brown represented the Masons, joined by Town Counsel and the Masons' attorney.

Neither side could find a precedent for a deal like this. Town boards change, and so does a fraternity's leadership, so both sides worked to protect each other long after the people at the table move on. After plenty of give and take, we reached an agreement. On April 9, 2026, the Town of Manchester took a significant step toward establishing its first dedicated senior center, closing on the purchase of two-thirds of the Masonic Hall property.

Over the years, we were approached on several occasions by real estate agents representing developers interested in this desirable harbor-front property. While those opportunities offered other possibilities for the future of the property, we chose not to pursue them. Instead, we focused our efforts on helping Manchester-by-the-Sea realize its long-standing goal of establishing a senior center. The seniors of our community have given so much over the years, and we felt that helping create a place dedicated to them was a meaningful way to give something back.

Why we must keep moving forward
The building is divided and the Town owns the space. What remains is turning it into the center residents have waited decades for, and that decision now goes to the voters.

Special Town Meeting: Monday, November 16, 2026, at 7 p.m., Memorial School. Voters will be asked to authorize $7.5 million for the senior and community center project. The Town plans to raise $3 million in private donations first and borrow the remaining estimated $4.5 million, and it has committed not to borrow until the full $3 million is received.

A separate special town election on Thursday, December 10, will decide the debt exclusion, which would allow that borrowing to be paid for outside the limits of Proposition 2½. Both votes are needed.

The men who built this temple raised the money with community pledges and a thermometer on an empty lot. Sixty years later, Manchester can do it again, with private donations leading the way. Please come to Memorial School on November 16, vote on December 10, and help make sure our seniors finally have a place to call their own.

Todd Crane
Jim Brown
Manchester Masonic Building Association