Cookstown Masonic Lodge

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

This is a detached single-storey former school house, built c.1884, constructed in sandstone with brick dressings; it has been in use as a Masonic Lodge since 1928. It is roughly square in plan with an enclosed central yard. There is a pitched single-storey return to the rear Southwest. There is a hipped single-storey return to the Southeast. Both returns are connected by a single-storey pitched return to the South. There is a further single-storey return to the West. The Masonic Lodge is set back from Fairhill Road within the Northern suburbs of Cookstown.

The front North elevation faces onto the road. It has two gable-ends to the left. There is an elliptical-headed window to each gable end. The main door is located in between these windows. To the right there are three segmental-headed windows; the right side was built at a later date.

The windows to the gable ends are large elliptical-headed openings. Each opening has two brick mullions and a cut-stone sill. There are red brick surrounds and red and blue engineering brick voussoirs to windows. Window frames are painted timber. There is a roundel above each window with a red and blue brick surround.
The doorway to the centre is segmental-headed. The door is panelled timber with a stained glass overlight.
To the right of the front elevation are three segmental-headed windows. They have chamfered brick reveals and voussoirs.

The side West elevation is gable-ended. The single-storey return is located to the left of the elevation.
The side East elevation has square-headed openings with brick surrounds as previous. All openings are blocked up.

The rear South elevation has a plain blank rendered gable to the left and a hipped roof to the right. Also to the right there are two blocked openings; these each have brick dressings.

The roofs are natural slate with cast-iron rainwater goods. There is a decorative metal ventilator to the main roof.
External walls to the front elevation are squared snecked stone with clay brick dressings to openings. The side West elevation is Flemish bond brick. There is a cut-stone plinth to the base.

Returns:
The pitched single-storey return to the rear Southwest is rendered. There is a tall shaped brick chimney with clay pots to the Southern apex.
The hipped single-storey return to the Southeast is in squared stone. There are square-headed blocked up window openings.
The single-storey pitched connecting return to the South is squared stone, and does not have any openings.
The single-storey return to the West has a square-headed window opening on a cut-stone sill. External walls are brick to the West, and render elsewhere.

Setting:
The Masonic Lodge is set back from Fairhill Road behind a brick boundary wall on a stone base with an iron gate. There is a concreted setback area to the front leading to the entrance door. The building is set to the Northern side of the town centre.

Historical information

The eastern, gabled-fronted, section of this was built as a school house in 1884. It is listed in the valuation book for that year as a ‘house, office and yard (private school)’, occupied by a John McKenzie, and valued at £15. The building is shown in its original form on the Cookstown valuation plan of 1892.

In 1909 the school had been reconstituted as ‘Cookstown Academy’ (the forerunner of the present Cookstown High School) with the Board of Governors of Cookstown Academy’ listed as the lessee and the building, which in that year had been enlarged to assume much of its present form, described as ‘Academy, offices and yard’, with a rateable value of £25. The school is recorded in the valuers’ office notebook of 1909, (which supplies details of newly-built or newly-extended structures liable for valuation), as built of ‘rubble masonry and brick’ with a slate roof, with the main section to east measuring 35ft x 41½ x 17, a small projection to the rear of this 13 x 6½ x 10, and the section to west 32 x 24 x 12. The estimated cost of constructing the new sections is given as £796.

In 1927 the Academy vacated the building and it was taken over by the local Masonic lodge for use as their new hall. Prior to this the lodge’s hall had been located within the ‘Commercial Buildings' in Molesworth Street (see HB09/13/015).

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI VAL/12B/37/5F Annual valuation revision book, Cookstown ED, 1882-90
2 PRONI VAL/12B/37/5G Annual valuation revision book, Cookstown ED, 1882-88
3 PRONI VAL/12B/37/5J Annual valuation revision book, Cookstown ED, 1889-94 [The reference number for this book is out of sequence in the
PRONI catalogue- the dates it covers are actually earlier than VAL/12B/37/5H.]
4 PRONI VAL/12B/37/5H Annual valuation revision book, Cookstown ED, 1895-99
5 PRONI VAL/12B/37/5K Annual valuation revision book, Cookstown ED, 1889-99
6 PRONI VAL/12E/171/1/1-2 Valuation plan of Cookstown, 1892-97 [2 sheets]
7 PRONI OS/33/1/1-5 OS plan of Cookstown, 1895 [5 sheets]
8 PRONI OS/9/10/2/1-2 OS plan of Cookstown, index map, 1895 [2 sheets]
9 PRONI OS/9/10/3/1-5 OS plan of Cookstown, 1895 [5 sheets]
10 PRONI VAL/12E/171/2/1-3 Valuation plan of Cookstown, 1897-1910 [3 sheets]
11 PRONI VAL/12B/37/7A Annual valuation revision book, Cookstown ED, 1901-07
12 PRONI VAL/12A/6/16 Valuers’ office notebook, Cookstown UD, 1901-10, p.84
13 PRONI VAL/12B/37/7B Annual valuation revision book, Cookstown ED, 1909-15
14 PRONI OS/33/2/1-4 OS plan, 1909 & 1918 [4 sheets]
15 PRONI VAL/12B/37/7C Annual valuation revision book, Cookstown ED, 1916-29
16 PRONI VAL/3G/142/1 /1-4 Valuation plan of Cookstown, 1936-37 [4 sheets]
17 PRONI VAL/3C/7/8 First general revaluation of Northern Ireland, Cookstown Urban, 1936-57
18 PRONI VAL/3G/142/2/1-4 Valuation plan of Cookstown, 1937-51
19 PRONI VAL/4B/6/10 Second general revaluation of Northern Ireland, Cookstown Urban vol.1, 1956-72
20 PRONI VAL/4B/6/11 Second general revaluation of Northern Ireland, Cookstown Urban vol.2E, 1956-72

Secondary sources
1 Oram, R.W. and Rankin, P.J., Historic buildings…Dungannon & Cookstown (Belfast, UAHS, 1971)

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
I. Quality and survival of Interior

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

This former school house has considerable social importance and local interest . It is a well detailed and proportioned middle-size building, designed in a late-Victorian / Edwardian style. Much of the external and internal fabric surviving substantially intact, in particular the Main Hall.