It was with great delight the brethren of the Province learned of the appointment of Brother Trevor M R Stewart as Proxy District Grand Master of the Eastern Province of the Cape of Good Hope on the 1st January 2008.

This has been considered as a thoroughly deserved honour for a well respected brother by all the brethren who have an association with Bro. Stewart. Trevor is very well known in Masonic circles, not only within the Province of Dunbartonshire but well beyond its boundaries.

Bro. Trevor M R Stewart was initiated into his Mother Lodge, Lodge Barns O’ Clyde No. 1018, almost 50 years ago in 1959. He is a member and Past Master of The Lodge Strathclyde No.1626, a Past Provincial Senior Grand Warden of Dunbartonshire and an Honorary Grand Junior Deacon.

He has had a long standing relationship with the Eastern Province of the Cape of Good Hope. It began when he was appointed Proxy Master of Lodge Good Friendship No. 1800 in 1992. During the 16 years since taking up that appointment Trevor has taking his duties to his Proxy Lodge very conscientiously indeed. He has been and remains in very regular contact with the Lodge and has entertained many of the brethren as visitors to his home over the years, providing them with food and lodging in their visits to Scotland.

Trevor is held in very high regard by all at Lodge Good Friendship and the feelings are mutual. Indeed, in 1994 Bro. Stewart presented the Lodge with a Harmony Jewel with the expressed wish that the Master of the Lodge would wear it on such occasions. This is most certainly the case and within the Lodge the jewel is referred to as “The Trevor Stewart Jewel”.

As a consequence of Bro. Stewart’s appointment he received an invitation to travel to South Africa for the Re-Installation of Bro. Donald Dye as the District Grand Master on 23 February 2008, an invitation Bro Stewart gratefully accepted. So at his own expense he travelled out to Port Elizabeth on the 21 February and was met at the airport by Bro Dye, Bro Alistair Wilson (District Grand Secretary), Bro John Hopkins (Master of Lodge Good Friendship No. 1800) and Bro Stief Rootman (Founder Master of No 1800). At long last Bro Stewart was able to put faces to the names he was so familiar with through his regular correspondence with his Proxy Lodge.

Whilst in South Africa Bro Stewart not only attended the Re-Installation Ceremony but he was also invited to attend a First Degree and a Mark. He found both degrees most excellently performed and thoroughly enjoyable. The hospitality extended to Bro Stewart everywhere he went was overwhelming.

Bro Stewart is a great advocate of Proxy Membership of Grand Lodge and would implore those brethren who are Proxy Members to make their contribution effective by keeping in close touch with the Lodges they are representing thus ensuring their voices and opinions are expressed in the deliberations of Grand Lodge.