Samuel Larison, 1860-1869. California. Gift in Memory of Jacques Noel Jacobsen, 2008.038.17.
The Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library counts hundreds of photographic portraits of Freemasons in its collection. While the names of the subjects of many of these photographs are lost to time, in other cases we can uncover information about the men captured by long-ago photographers. Even brief biographies of these sitters offer a fascinating look at the Freemasons who—in big and small ways—helped shape the United States.
The subject of this photograph, Samuel Larison, is one example. Lured by the Gold Rush, he emigrated to California in 1853. A miner for a few years, Larison “met with more or less success” in the gold fields. Eventually he left prospecting and purchased land to farm near the town of Cloverdale in Sonoma County, California. There he became a pioneer winemaker, a cooper for the new wine industry in the county, and a charter member of the town’s Masonic lodge.
In the 1870s Samuel Larison (1821-1899) advertised multiple times in the local paper, bringing attention to his work with this declaration: “Wine-Growers, Attention! Cooperage of all kinds on hand and made to order….” A short article published in several California newspapers in 1874 detailed that Larison used 2,000 staves of white oak made from wood harvested in Lake County, adjacent to Sonoma County, to make wine-pipes. Each of these specialized wine barrels held 150 gallons--about 750 modern bottles of wine. Starting in 1868, Larison began cultivating wine grapes. Within fifteen years, he had planted 18 acres with Zinfandel, Burgundy, and other grape varieties. In the 1890s, a local newspaper writer observed, while visiting the Cloverdale Winery, that “a load of Burgundy grapes grown by Samuel Larison…were the best we ever saw.”
Larison had first become a Mason as a young man in Ohio. He was a member of Yuba Lodge No. 39 in Marysville from 1856 to 1857. Later he was one of the charter members of Curtis Lodge No. 140 in Cloverdale, founded soon after he settled in town. The lodge received its charter in 1860—the same year Larison served as the lodge’s Tyler. Decades later, an obituary-writer recalled Larison’s connection of over fifty years with the fraternity, describing him as “an ardent admirer of masonry….”
This photograph shows Larison wearing the regalia of a Royal Arch Mason sometime in the 1860s. His obituary stated that he was a “chapter mason,” likely meaning a member of a Royal Arch Chapter. When Larison first became a Royal Arch Mason or which chapter he belonged to is not known. Though many details about Larison’s Masonic career remain to be uncovered, this portrait of Larison in his apron suggests the pride he felt in his association with the group.
Many years after this photograph was taken, Larison continued to demonstrate his devotion to Freemasonry. In 1895 he was the oldest living member of the lodge and attended an installation of lodge officers. The local paper recorded that on this occasion, even though Larison did not travel into to town often, he did for this event as, “his fraternal love for Masonry was to[o] overpowering to resist this opportunity to meet again with his brothers.”
If you would like to see more photographic portraits from the 1800s and 1900s, please visit the Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library’s website, srmml.org, where hundreds are available for viewing in our online collections database.
Many thanks to Thomas Krummell, Assistant Grand Secretary/Recorder, Grand York Rite of California, for his help in researching Samuel Larison's Masonic activities in California.
By Hilary Anderson Stelling, Director of Collections and Exhibitions
Scottish Rite Museum & Library, Lexington, Massachusetts
