Lou’s View

Sometimes, when I’m stuck for a column, I just grab something random and see what happens. I’ve been known to open Linn’s History to a random page and write whatever I find there. I have a bunch of files: Women, ghosts, townships (the interesting ones, at least), houses….And one on the mayors of Lock Haven.

That one is usually good for a column. I’ve written about some of the mayors, but not all. And it doesn’t hurt to stretch myself into a new topic.

Having explained all that, let’s talk about George Mason, shall we?

George W. Mason was born in Philadelphia in September of 1854. He went to Girard College and graduated in 1869. His obituary says that he moved to Lock Haven “in the early seventies,” which gave me a mental image of bell-bottoms and psychedelic vinyl records until I realized they meant the 1870s. Mason accepted a job with local pharmacist J.W. Wallace, and came to Clinton County to learn pharmacy as a trade.

Using that as a stepping stone, Mason opened up his own pharmacy on the corner of the Opera House block, at Main and Grove Streets. He bought the entire building, which is quite a bit of real estate, and made his home at 312 North Grove Street, behind his pharmacy and up against the alley.

Mason was elected mayor of Lock Haven in 1888, took office in April, and then was promptly hit with the 1888 flood in June. The newspaper reported,”Mr. Mason, as mayor, was equal to the emergency and labored zealously day and night as the head of the relief organizations to restore the city to its former condition and to relieve the stress in many homes.”

He continued to serve as mayor until 1891, when he was replaced by John Wynne, the only Lock Haven mayor ever to die in office. Wynne lived exactly one block away on Vesper Street.

Amusingly, Mason was a Mason. That is to say, he was active in the local Masonic lodge and often spent time in the building on Main Street. It seems that much of his life was clustered into that neighborhood—His home, business, and organization were all within an easy few steps of Main and Grove Streets. His obituary lists an impressive number of lodges, circles, and degrees, none of which I fully understand, and presumably, neither would you. So I’m not going to list them here. The guy was very active, let’s say that.

Mason never retired. He continued to run his drugstore almost to the very end of his life. On March 26, 1922, he wasn’t feeling well, largely due to being diabetic. The next day, a Monday, he wasn’t able to get out of bed. (A lot of us feel that way about Mondays, but this was out of character for Mason.) On Tuesday, he went into a coma, and Dr. A.F Hardt of Williamsport was called to treat him. On Wednesday, March 29, he was awake and seemed to recognize some of his family members, but that was the end—At 9:40 PM, George Mason died in his bed at home.

He was buried in Highland Cemetery, several of the other Masons from his lodge assisting as pallbearers. He left behind his wife, a son, and a daughter.

The newspaper noted that he was a “good citizen,” and there are far worse ways to be remembered. The obituary said,”His success in business was due in a large measure to his unfailing courtesy, his reliability, and the employment of careful, dependable pharmacists.”