Bethesda Lodge 142

This area was first settled about 1835 which eventually became Upshur County. When the county was established in 1846, provision required that the county seat be located within five miles of the geographic center and that it be called Gilmer. Gilmer’s first Masonic Lodge was established prior to 1851, called Gilmer Masonic Lodge #61. In 1851 Gilmer's Masonic Lodge, No. 61, formulated plans to open a school. Within the same year the school became a reality. It was called Gilmer Masonic Female Institute. In 1852, Lodge No. 61 was disbanded and returned its charter to the Grand Lodge of Texas that December. Bethesda Masonic Lodge No. 142 received a charter in 1853 and sponsored the Gilmer Masonic Male Academy (1854). In 1861 the lodge rented the school building to Morgan H. Looney, who established Looney School. Bethesda Lodge incorporated a new school and, on February 9, 1860, received a charter from the Eighth Texas Legislature for the Upshur Masonic College at Gilmer. O. M. Stovall was appointed principal of the school. Mrs. Martha Weatherly and her daughter, Miss Margaret Weatherly, were selected as teachers. This school was coeducational, as had been all the school sessions since the 1857 closings of the male and female schools. To honor the session then closing, the school presented a procession on July 13, 1860. Still open in April 1861, Upshur Masonic College soon closed because of the Civil War. To today, Gilmer’s Bethesda Lodge #142 still operates and supports education through scholarships and local fund raising events.