Dawes E. Sturgis

Dawes E. Sturgis was a native of New Bedford, Massachusetts, and was educated in New York City. He came to Houston at the age of 17 and worked ten years for the Southern Pacific lines. He then went into the jewelry business with Sidney Hart in the firm of Hart and Sturgis, later becoming its sole owner and running it for seven years. After selling the business he spent more than 20 years in the county tax office, where he was deputy county tax assessor and collector at the time of his death.

He received his degrees in Gray Lodge: the Entered Apprentice on October 28, 1897, the Fellowcraft on December 15, 1897, and the Master Mason degree on January 24, 1898. He became Junior Deacon in 1899 and advanced steadily up the line.

He took the East in 1903, installed by J. C. Kidd, aided by J. W. Haskins, at one of the most unsettled moments in the lodge’s history. The old Grand Lodge Temple had just been sold, and that April Gray Lodge had to vacate the room it had furnished and occupied for more than 30 years, moving into the Ruthven Commandery room on the fourth floor. His year was spent planning for a permanent home. The lodge subscribed $1,500 in stock in the new Masonic Building Association and named Past Masters John G. Tod and J. R. Cade as its directors.

His year also showed the lodge’s charity at its best. When member M. E. Ligon fell ill at Kerrville, Gray Lodge asked the Masons there to care for him and see to his burial, which was done at Hearne. His widow wrote that “when a society has stood by a member until his eyes have closed in sleep, and mingled their tears and prayers at the open grave with those who are near and dear, we believe they have fully exemplified the principle of Brotherly love.” In November 1903 the lodge received its first petition from a man in the oil business, a sign of the Houston to come, and in December a Past Master from Rising Sun Lodge No. 1401 of Kobe, Japan, visited and spoke on Masonry in China.

He was a member of all the York Rite bodies, a 32° Scottish Rite Mason, a Shriner of El Mina Temple, and a member of the Presbyterian Church. He died on February 25, 1944, and was buried with Masonic ceremonies in Prairie Lea Cemetery at Brenham. He was survived by his wife, Fannie Bryan Sturgis, and three daughters.