St Oswald Charity Night Another Success
The St Oswald Lodge held their second annual Grand Charity Raffle evening on Thursday May7th at Freemasons Hall Darlington and what a splendid evening it was.
The evening began with the Worshipful Master, Andrew Thomas conducting the usual business of the lodge and then Keith Schaible from Castle Lodge in Staindrop giving a most informative and interesting talk on the ”Decline of Freemasonry during Nazi Germany”.
The brethren from all over the Province, Yorkshire, Ireland and 9 brethren from Hartlepool on the occasion of Harte Lodge fraternal visit to St Oswald then retired to the festive board where everyone enjoyed an excellent 5-course dinner.
The main event of the evening was the raffle and auction of 105 Prizes arranged and compared by Lodge Secretary, Andy Watson and Charity Steward Don Bowen but it was a real team effort with the Stewards, Darren Skippen, Gordon Angus and Rob Stephenson selling the raffle tickets, Neil Pritchard drawing the winning numbers and the treasurer, Allan Bell aided by Duncan Maw handing out the prizes to the winners and owing to the generosity of the Worshipful Master of St Oswald and all present on the night the evening managed to raise the amazing sum of £1,660 to be used to support charitable purposes in the Darlington area.
The night was not only a Grand Raffle as Mick Lambird gave an excellent rendition of his Napoleons Retreat from Wigan monologue, Don Marshall gave his funny Masonic Anecdotes and Jokes and Ian Varty gave an after dinner education of the ”working tools of the festive board” with passion and sincerity to the 64 dining brethren as entertainment during the nights proceedings. It was a pleasure to see a full dining hall, full of smiling faces with brethren enjoying their Masonry and helping charitable causes.