Roddy Lodge No. 734, A.F. & A.M.

Roddy lies four miles northeast of Mabank in Van Zandt County, and its lodge left before its post office did. The Handbook of Texas dates settlement to about 1840 on Widow's Prairie, a mile east of the present site, and says the town was named for the family of Steve Gavan Roddy, who arrived in 1884, built a sawmill, gristmill and gin, and opened a store by 1885. The post office ran from 1885 to 1907, after which mail came from Mabank. The lodge moved to Mabank in 1906, a year before the mail did.

What the plaque says

Roddy Lodge No. 734, A.F. & A.M. The community of Roddy (4 mi. NE) was established by Stephen G. Roddy in 1884. The Roddy Masonic Lodge was chartered on May 14, 1892. The 24 charter members included Worshipful Master S. G. Roddy and many former members of the lodge in Prairieville, located a few miles northwest of Roddy. Early lodge meetings were held on the second floor of the Stanhiser General Merchandise Store in Roddy. In 1906 the lodge relocated to Mabank, at that time a rapidly growing railroad town established in 1900. The lodge met in several locations including the "Jones Building" located at the southwest corner of Third and Market Streets. Shortly after that building was destroyed by fire in 1914, the lodge met in a hall located above a post office at the northwest corner of Third and Market Streets. A new lodge hall, consisting of a large lodge room, reception room, kitchen, and preparation rooms was built near this site in 1958. The lodge, which has a history of raising funds to help local schools improve their facilities, has established an educational grant program which annually awards scholarships to two of the area's graduating high school seniors. Roddy Lodge also contributes to the Scottish Rite Children's Hospital of Dallas. (1993)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• No. 1 British Flying Training School Museum — 26 mi
  A free museum at Terrell's airport where about 2,200 RAF cadets learned to fly between 1941 and 1945, with logbooks, uniforms, letters and original training aircraft.
• Petroleum Industry Park — 29 mi
  The pipes and drilling tower mark where a city water well struck oil on June 9, 1894, the start of the first Texas field to produce oil and gas in important quantities.

More markers nearby

• First Presbyterian Church of Mabank — steps away
• Mabank — 0.7 mi
• Capt. Edward Thomas Broughton and the Johnson Guards — 7.8 mi
• Prairieville — 7.8 mi