by Daniel L.. Matthews {ARM14}

"All the degrees of Scottish Masonry can be received by good men of every race and every religious faith: and any degree that cannot be received, that is exclusively confined to men of any one creed, is not masonry, which is universal, but some other thing, that is exclusive, and therefore intolerant. All our degrees have, in that, one object. Each inculcates toleration, and the union of men of all faiths; and each erects a platform on which the Mohammedan, the Israelite, and the Christian may stand side by side and hand in hand, as true brethren."
Albert Pike

Egbert Austin Williams better known as Bert Williams was a legendary comedian, considered by many one of the greatest vaudeville performers in the history of the American stage which spanned more than two decades and just as momentous a Master Mason of Edinburgh Scotland. Booker T. Washington once modestly voiced, "Bert Williams has done more for the race than I have. He has smiled his way into people's hearts. I have obliged to fight my way."

Bert Williams was born in Antigua, West Indies on November 12, 1874. His family moved to the United States when he was a child, settling in Riverside, California in 1885. After Williams graduated form high school he continued his studies in civil engineering. However, he had to abandon his studies to help support his family because of his father's poor health and scarcity of family finances. Williams developed a natural ability for captivating people with song and mimicry so he went from café to café in San Francisco's Barbery Coast singing minstrel ditties and passing the hat.

As Williams continued to perform on the streets of San Francisco he was given the opportunity to join Lew Johnson's minstrel tour of lumber camps in 1893 which conducted performances between San Francisco and Eureeka. His character in the minstrel tour was a slow-witted shiftless, slouch Negro who could neither read nor write who had a certain resistant, and not altogether inaccurate, philosophy of life. This character in no way stimulated Williams's abilities. However, he was earning $12 a week. Williams not content with his part in Johnson's minstrel tour left, and joined the show at the San Francisco Museum (music hall). But left after only a few months to join Martin and Seig's Mastodon Minstrels at another San Francisco theater, a troupe made up of five black men and five white men. This move would soon propel Williams's career as a stage performer; there he would be introduced to George Walker and this partnership would become one of the foremost successful musical comedy team of their era.

Williams and Walker within a number of years would astonish audiences wherever they performed their famous comedy duo and would be known as "Williams and Walker." In the summer of 1896 the two adopted the "Burnt Cork" caricature and bill themselves as "The Two Real Coons," as a means of differentiating themselves from the large number of black face acts performed by white actors in Burnt Cork.. While appearing in Indiana mid 1896 they were contacted by Thomas Canary, a well-known theatrical producer. Canary was so impressed by their act that he cast them in "The Gold Bug" a new show he had scheduled to open in New York City in the fall of that year. Although Canary's "The Gold Bug" was a failure, the duo of Williams and Walker prevailed. Within a half a year they would be considered the leading stage act in Vaudeville. Their tremendous success would headlined the two in a number of musical comedies of song. In the summer of 1897 the duo performed in a number of first class houses in Boston and New York's Hammerstein's Olympia. On August 15, 1900 Williams and Walker did a vaudeville sketch in New York's Procter's Theater. As Williams and Walker left Procter's Theater around midnight the two are completely unaware of a race riot in the city with white mobs beating every black they could find. Williams went home, however Walker had plans downtown with a colleague named Ernest Hogan. Walker and Hogan were accosted and then assaulted. Hogan was savagely beaten, Walker escapes with minor abrasions and hides all night in a cellar.

In the summer of 1902 Williams and Walker begin work on "In Dahomey" (a satire on the American Colonization Society), and "Back to Africa". This turned out to be one of Williams and Walker's greatest achievements on stage. The entire cast consisted of black performers, which made black theatrical history that would encompass some of the most talented black performers, and vaudeville acts to be found to include the wives of the two men, Lottie Thompson Williams and Ada Overton Walker. In early 1903 visibility was growing and "In Dahomey" was attracting attention of the more predominate white theaters in New York like the New York Theater at 59th and Broadway, which catered to the upper class citizens of New York also a tour to London was in the making. On April 23 Williams and Walker with the cast of "In Dahomey" sailed for London on the Urania. The cast arrived May 7, to open at the Shaftesbury Theater May 18 playing to a sympathetic but not very spirited audience. However, on June 23, the tide turned after a lavish command performance at Buckingham Palace for Edward VII on the birthday of the Prince of Wales (who later became the Duke of Windsor). The show ran for seven months, touring the British Isles.

May 1904 Williams and Walker and company conduct a stage performance at the Empire Theater in Edinburgh, Scotland. The manager of the theater was a member of Lodge Waverley No. 597. The manager of the Empire Theater introduced Williams and other members of the group to Lodge Waverley No. 597, the Lodge only 100 yards from the Theater. It was proposed by James Holiday and seconded by William Gordon both Master Masons of Lodge Waverley No. 597 that Bert Williams, together with ten other theatrical colleagues be recommended: (Egbert Austin Williams NY, age: 30) (George Walker NY age: 31), (George Catlin NY age: 37), (John Hill NY age: 30), (Peter Hampton NY age: 33), (Alexander Rogers NY age: 28), (Henry Gray AL age: 28), (John Edwards IN age: 36), (Green Tapley MI age: 33), and (James Lightfoot Canada age: 30) become Master Masons of Lodge Waverley No. 597. Lodge Roll No. 813 for the candidates. Candidates where Initiated 2 May 1904 Passed 16 May 1904 Raised to the Degree of Master Mason on 1 June 1904. After receiving their master mason degree they also received their Mark Degree on 1 June 1904.

Upon their return in late 1904 form Europe, Williams and Walker toured the U.S. for 40 weeks strait playing to receptive crowds at the Grand Opera House and going as Far West as Portland and San Francisco, and as far south as St. Louis. The show made $64,000 four times the original $15,000 investment that Hurtig and Seamon started with. By the end of 1905 Williams writes the song "Nobody" with Alexander Rogers. The song "Nobody" becomes Williams's trademark.

By 1908 Williams's popularity had grown even further. He and Walker along with Alexander Rogers and others became active in organizing and co-founding a black actor's union called The "Negro's Society" also known as the "FROGS". This charitable organization was patterned after the American Actors Beneficial Association from which blacks had always been excluded. The name was chosen by the association to symbolize their feelings and responsibilities to those of theater and the community. The avowed purpose of the organization was to raise money for charitable purposes as well as to create an archival collection of theatrical material. Walker became the president of the organization and prior to purchasing their own clubhouse meetings were conducted at Walkers home. As their organization grew in popularity the FROGS became highly respected within the Harlem community and eventually extended its membership to include non-theatrical professionals. In the summer of 1908 Williams and Walker shared a vaudeville bill with Eva Tanguay (the "I don't care" girl), who later has an affair with Walker. Around Christmas of the same year, Walker wrote a message to readers of the (The Age) entitled ("Bert and Me and Them")

Williams and Walker performed together for the last time in February 1909. George Walker was forced to retire because of a crippling illness. In 1907 Walker had contracted syphilis and, later afflicted with paralysis succumbed to the crippling illness January 6, 1911.

After the brake-up in 1909, Williams continued touring. He performed Ziegfeld Follies, in March 1909. He and Ada Overton Walker, performed a slightly revised version of "Bandana Land" in Philadelphia. Their performance received good reviews. In April "Bandana Land" played at the Yorkville Theater in Brooklyn New York. After the company's last engagement there, Williams decided he couldn't run the company without his business manager and partner George Walker. Early summer Williams performed vaudeville as a singles act, doing dialect stories and songs. He toured major cities like Boston, New York, Pittsburgh, and Rockaway Beach. Late summer Williams worked with Alexander Rogers again on a new full-length production. ("Mr. Lode of Koal")

In 1910 Florenz Ziegfeld, (the most influential theatrical producer of the time) signed Williams to a three-year contract with the Ziegfeld Follies. The signing of Williams was announced in the papers, and further his popularity as a stage performer. This signing would make Williams the first and only black performer to appear in the cast. During the Follies production tours Williams performed a Friars Club benefit, where he shares a dressing room with George M. Cohan. Cohan put Williams up for membership however, Williams's is ineligible because of his race. In 1913 Williams left the Follies and does a variety show, for the

FROGS, which reunites him with old friends and colleagues of the stage. The variety show with Ada Overton Walker, and S.H. Dudley, is a comic sketch featuringWilliams in drag. The show was intended to be performed once, but is so successful that it tours Philadelphia, Baltimore, Richmond, and Washington D.C. for a week.

Bert Williams's returns to the Ziegfeld Follies in 1914, working with great stage performers like Ed Wynn, W.C. Fields, and Will Rogers.. In mid 1914 Williams performed at Hammerstein's Victoria Theater where he met James Reese Europe. Europe conducted the first Negro orchestra to play a first class theater (Hammerstein's Victoria Theater). He conducts a pit orchestra for Vernon and Irene Castle's dance routine. From 1914-1918 Williams signs a contract with Columbia Records. Over this time he cuts 17 titles.

In 1918, Williams quarrels with Ziegfeld, and left the Follies before they opened in New York. However, he did appear in the Midnight Frolics where he performed "Til Martin Comes" (a story which Williams wrote). In 1919 Williams returned to the Ziegfeld Follies for the last season. He proformed popular skits with Eddie Dowling, Gus Van, and Ray Dooley. Although there was an actors strike (Actors Equity strike), Williams was not affected because he wasn't a member of Actors Equity because of his race. In 1920, W.C. Fields petitions the union to allow Williams to be a member of Actors Equity. August 3, 1920 He becomes a member.

In January 1922, rehearsals begin for "The Pink Slip" written for Williams by Walter Deleon and produced by Al Woods. Williams stared in the production, and was the only Black cast member. After an out of town try out by Williams, The Pink Slip is renamed "Under the Bamboo Tree." It opens in Chicago before going to New York. Williams contracted a virus which would later developed into pneumonia. Although ill, he insisted on going on with the show. Saturday, February 25, 1922 Bert Williams collapses in the middle of his 2nd performance that day. At 11:30 p.m. on Saturday March 4, he dies in New York City, at 47 years of age. Upon his death New York newspapers carried notice, of March 6, 1904 under the auspices of St. Cecile Lodge No. 568, New York. At the request of the Grand Lodge of Scotland his funeral was held in a Masonic Temple were full Masonic Rite were given by white masons.

Brother Williams's projected a lively and energetic persona in his performances and enjoyed full popularity until the end. Yet in his prime Williams was hailed with casual racism like any other black performer. He read many of the great literary masterpieces, and could discuss Darwin, Voltaire, Kant, and Goethe among others. It was said that next to the stage his greatest interest was the history of Africa and of his people in America and the West Indies. During George Walker's illness Williams supported him financially until his death in 1911 and continued to support his co-founded charity The Negro's Society (FROGS) which he was elected president in 1910. From behind the comic minstrel mask, Williams added another dimension missing from most vaudevillian humor what W.C. Fields called a "Deep undercurrent of pathos." As Fields moderately voiced, "Bert Williams is the funniest man I ever saw and the saddest man I ever knew."

Let us not forget Waverley Lodge No. 597 of Edinburgh, Scotland. With racial hatred in the U.S. at one of its highest peaks, Masonry in Scotland was practicing brotherly love. Waverley Lodge No. 597 was practicing this traditional value, they believed in uniting men of every country, sect, and opinion regardless of race or religion. Their actions as masons demonstrated to those in the communities and world the regard which all people should hold for one another. Waverley Lodge No. 597 took two important steps to make 10 men welcomed in masonry regardless of skin color or religious belief.