Freemasonry on the Frontier

W. Bro. Dr. John Stephen Wade was born in Edinburgh in 1947, but moved to Leeds when his father was appointed lecturer at the university there. He was educated at High Storrs Grammar School Sheffield and the University of Durham where he read Classics. Returning to Sheffield, he taught the Classical languages at King Ecgbert School, the Sheffield College and the University of Sheffield, where he finished his full-time career as Teaching Fellow in Latin and Greek. Having taken early retirement in 2005, John Wade continued to teach Medieval Latin to postgraduate students in the Department of History at the University and assisted in the Centre for Research into Freemasonry until its closure in 2010.  Early in 2009 he was awarded his PhD for a thesis on the Latin writings of the Tudor martyrologist, John Foxe.  He has now fully retired, although he seems to have become a full-time Freemason!

Bro. John Wade was initiated into Fellowship Lodge No. 4069 in Sheffield in 1981 and exalted into Fellowship Royal Arch Chapter No. 4069 in 1985.  He was installed as Master of Fellowship Lodge in 1991 and was again in the chair for 2012.  He was the founding Master of Amadeus Lodge No. 9359 in the Province of Derbyshire 1994, serving again as Master in 2010.  He is a Past Provincial Junior Grand Warden in both Yorkshire West Riding and Derbyshire, and in April 2014 he was appointed Past Assistant Grand Director of Ceremonies in the United Grand Lodge of England.  He is a Past Provincial Grand Scribe Nehemiah in the Royal Arch degree, a Past Sovereign in the Rose Croix (and was in May 2016 promoted to the 31st degree), a Past Grand Senior Overseer in the Mark degree and currently the District Grand Organist of Italy for that degree. He is Past Divisional Sword Bearer in the Red Cross of Constantine, as well as being an active member of a number of other orders. From 2003-2005 he was President of the Sheffield Masonic Study Circle.  Having been elected a full member of Quatuor Coronati Lodge No. 2076 in 2005, Bro. Wade was installed as Master for 2009-10, and has been Editor of the Lodge's Transactions (AQC) since 2009. Bro. Wade was appointed Prestonian Lecturer for 2009, his Lecture being entitled: '"Go and do thou likewise: English Masonic Processions from the Eighteenth to the Twentieth Centuries.' In 2013 he was the Master of the Manchester Lodge for Masonic Research No. 5502 and is a Past Master of Lodge Hope of Kurrachee No. 337 in the Scottish Constitution. In Italy he was from 2011-2014 the Master of Loggia Santa Cecilia No. 180 (G.L.R.I.) and will be installed in the chair of Keats & Shelley Lodge No. 1 in Rome next year. In the United States he was appointed in 2009 to the rank of Honorary Grand Lecturer in the Grand Lodge of the State of New Jersey. Bro. Wade is also the musical director of the Sheffield and District Masonic Choir which he founded in 1991.