(former)Masonic Lodge No. 8 A.F.&A.M. - Fort Scott, Kansas - Masonic Temples on Waymarking.com

1867
Italianate style
Inventory: 011-1830-00151
Status: contributing.

Description: This is a rectangular three-story brick commercial building with a four-bay front. It has a flat roof and parapet. There is a recessed glazed wooden entrance door with an adjacent entrance to the second floor. There are large non-historic display windows with a non-historic awning. On the second and third floors, there are masonry openings with smooth-cut stone sills and low-arched lintels. The windows are 111 wooden double-hung sash. A large Masonic emblem is embedded between the second and third windows on the third floor. The eave is ornamented with a stone belt course and vertical paired stone inserts forming panels as raised brick dentil molding and a slightly projecting brick cornice.

History: According to the 1990 survey, this building was built to house a Masonic Hall in 1867. "Subscriptions to the amount of $5,300 were taken yesterday at this office [for Masonic Lodge and Odd Fellows Hall] ... building will be put up next to the brick block now in course of erection by B. P. McDonald on the corner of Wall Street and Scott Avenue." (Fort Scott Monitor 24 July 1867 and 7 August 1867). In 1884, this building's street address was 116 E. Wall Street. By 1888 it had been re-numbered as 118. According to the Sanborn maps this building has housed numerous businesses including a drug store (1884, 1888); the Fort Scott Monitor occupied the building with composing on the second and bookbinding on the third floor (1893); "storage and setting up barrels" (1899); a plumbing business (1906); lodge hall on third floor (1912); furniture storage and lodge hall (1917).

Integrity: The building retains sufficient architectural integrity to be listed as a contributing resource.