Thirty-five Old Malvernians answered the call when the idea of consecrating a lodge for old boys and current and former masters and governors of the school was put forward.
Most came from the law, the armed forces and the City of London, these three accounting for fully two thirds of the Founders. The remainder covered the range of occupations one would expect of Public School men of the time including the Church, land & property, teaching, engineering, trade and mercantile occupations and the civil service. There was even a student and a self-professed gentleman. Two had been ordained, one was a doctor and twelve had been commissioned.
They hailed from a wide range of mother lodges, with the University Lodges providing the single largest concentration, notably three men from the Apollo, one from Isaac Newton and one from Churchill, reflecting the Founders’ preferences for Oxford, which place accounted for seven of the Founders’ tertiary education if not all their masonic education. Cambridge only offered two of its number, a number matched by Trinity College Dublin. Only one of the light blues came from Isaac Newton, and TCD’s Lodge does not figure.
Class lodges associated with their members’ professions accounted for another seven Founders, with regimental lodges offering up a further four, legal lodges a brace, and a lone representative of a medical lodge.
To this should also be added four lodges in India, from Madras, Bengal, Allahabad and the Punjab, which were created by brethren on Imperial military and civil service. Two were from ‘Red Apron’ lodges and one was from a PSLC lodge.
There were, unsurprisingly, a good number from lodges in the three counties area, but there were a a pair of initiates of Dene Lodge No 2228, and a further founder joined that lodge giving Cookham Dene an unexpected concentration of Masonic Malvernians in the inter-war years.
There were two pairs of brothers as well as Brothers – the Clarks and the Robertsons.
One of the Petitioners, George Ticehurst, did not become a Founder, and one of the Founders, Lt Col Herbert Clark, did not sign the petition. Both are included in the list below, which is ordered in accordance with the petition.