Resolution 230172

..Title Renaming the 4300 block of Broad Street to "Prince Hall Way" to recognize, honor, and celebrate the life and legacy of Prince Hall. ..Body WHEREAS, Prince Hall was born at Bridgetown, Barbados, West Indies, about September 12, 1748. He was freeborn. His father, Thomas Prince Hall was an Englishman and his mother a free non-white woman of French extraction; and WHEREAS, On March 6, 1775, Prince Hall and fourteen other Black men of Boston were made Master masons in an Army Lodge attached to one of the General Gages regiments. They were then stationed near Boston. This hall granted Prince Hall and his brethren authority to meet as a lodge, to go in procession on St John's Day, and as a lodge bury their dead. However, they could not confer degrees nor perform any other Masonic 'work"; and WHEREAS, In March 1784, Prince Hall petitioned the Grand Lodge of England, through a worshipful master of a subordinate lodge in London for a warrant or charter; and WHEREAS, On May 6, 1787, by virtue of the authority of this Charter, African Lodge No. 458 was established and begin work as a regular Masonic body. In accordance with masonic usage of that time, a General Assembly of colored Masons met in Masons Hall, Water Street, Boston Massachusetts, on June 24, 1791, and formed African Grand Lodge with Prince Hall as its Grand Master, which he held until his death in December 1807; and WHEREAS, One June 24, 1808, pursuant to a call from Nero Prince, the Deputy Grand Master, representatives of the three then exiting lodges met in Boston and changed the name of the Grand lodge to M. W. Prince Hall Grand Lodge, F & AM of Massachusetts, in memory of Prince Hall, who left authentic goodness and a legacy for all Masons; and WHEREAS, According to the existing records, the first warranted Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons among men of color in Pennsylvania, was erected by the Right Worshipful Grand Master Prince Hall, assisted by the Grand Wardens Cyrus Forbes and George Middleton of the African Grand Lodge of Massachusetts on September 22, 1797, in Philadelphia. This Lodge was known as the African Lodge No. 459 of Philadelphia; now, therefore, be it RESOLVED, BY THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA, That 4300 Block of Broad Street be also named "Prince Hall Way". ..End