Episode 109. The Nudge (ft. Douglas J. Campbell)

Join us for a legend’s journey with the great Doug Campbell. We chat sequential decades of Annual Communications, proficiency of the MN Masonic Code, and the positive power of encouragement to fellow Brothers. 

“The monitor exam…that was the door that opened to all my involvement with Grand Lodge activities. It became a huge part of my life.” 

Long-haul Harley riding, lasting friendships, the secret to memorization, skipping commencement (!), and more. 

A life member of Cataract No. 2, RWB Doug is the Grand Secretary Emeritus of the Grand Lodge of Minnesota. He and his wife Patty are proud grandparents and enjoying retired life in South Minneapolis. 

Transcript

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How far back does Masonic involvement run in your family? My great-grandfather was a Mason, in port here in Michigan, and I even have his black grotto fez in my possessions along with one of his ciphers. That was your great-grandfather? That was my great-grandfather. My grandfather was an odd fellow, so, uh, he, he had no involvement in Masons of course my dad was his principal reason why I became a Mason. I believe. I heard your brother recall a story once of being young, young kids in the car, and your dad was driving and rehearsing his lines or was working on some of his memorization. Do you remember that? I have no recollection of him actually working on things. But I do remember his blue book, uh, his cipher, of course. Um, not being able to read it, not knowing what it was, but, uh, mark, of course, is almost, well, two plus years older than me, so He has better recollections of some of those things. Was that Blue book by his side though? A lot in those days? Yes. Yeah. You were born in Port Huron, Michigan. A cold day in February, 1953. Went to grade school there. Relocated to Bloomington in January of 63. Dad's job change or what brought you to Minnesota. My dad, uh, worked for Beneficial Finance. It was a national finance company and as he progressed up the ladder, he was transferred a number of times, actually a short stop in Chicago on the way to here to Minneapolis for four months. And when he left Minneapolis, he went to Seattle for seven years and then Salt Lake City for till his retirement. You were in the Bloomington School system, was it the first graduating class at Jefferson? I was in the first graduating class at Jefferson. Unfortunately, I didn't graduate from Jefferson. Did you move again? We moved in, uh, November of my senior year. November, 1970. I went to Bellevue, Washington, which was some Amish high school where our mascot was the totes, the totems. Oh, wow. And you don't see that anymore. And I, uh. Yeah, they had a huge totem pole in the middle of the square that, uh, was the, the school mascot. Anyway, I, uh, spent about what, six months there, graduated at the end of May, packed up a van, and, uh, moved back to Minnesota the next day. I didn't actually go to my commencement. You skipped commencement. It was not that big a deal to me to be out there. Really. Were you just not having it in Washington? Different? What was different about it? Um, I was, uh, thoroughly Minnesotan by then, and I had already planned to go to school here in, uh, Minnesota, Alexandria. And, um, just added back as soon as I could. See you later, I can mail the diploma and I'm, I'm good. Yeah, I learned later. My mom cried for days. Sorry, mom. and then you went to Alexandria area Technical College, Normandale Community College and the U of M. You were a busy guy. Yeah. But I didn't complete any of them. Yeah. In Alexandria, it was a two year program. I made it through one year. I had, uh, great grades and everything, but by then I had decided that probably being a small town cop or a rural sheriff was not really gonna be in the cards for me. I enjoyed my time up in Alexandria, but I knew that where the placements were going and yeah. And their program was not designed for urban. So I moved on. Probably good to know that. In the moment though, does it ever seem like we ask too much of young people at such a young age, what do you wanna do for the rest of your life? Well, that was almost a whim to just even decide that I, oh, I could be a cop. You know, I was a big guy. I just decided that that didn't have as much of a future as business probably would for me. Mm-hmm. We're going way back in time. The Perkins on 4 94 used to be known as Uncle John's Pancake House in Bloomington. Is that the same place? That's the place, 4 94 in France? Yes. You were a bus boy, dishwasher, cook, kitchen manager for several years until about 1973. And you met your wife, Patty There. I did. Um, she worked there, uh, not as early as I did'cause she's a couple years younger than me. I worked with her brother and got to know the family. And, um, when she started working there, she was only 15 when we started dating. I was a junior in high school and she was ninth grader, but we've been together ever since. No kidding. I did not know that. That was where you two met? Yeah, So then fast forward, what led you into being a loan office manager? You worked for Beneficial Finance Company. at the time, uh, when I. Started working there. You did not need a college degree, which I still was not degreed. And, uh, my brother had already started working there and my dad was no longer in the Twin Cities, so it wasn't a nepotism thing per se. Um, but I knew people from my association at social events, with his work coworkers and, uh, other supervisors. So it was, uh. Pretty easy to get my foot in the door. It was an entry-level position just like anybody else would start there. And it turned out I was pretty good at collecting bills and, and uh, making loans. Maybe not nepotism outright, but it helps to know somebody you knew, a guy. It, it always helps to know somebody. Yeah. you and Patty got married in 1974. You've been in the same house since 19 76, 50 years this year. Correct. Where did that time go? Uh, it's funny the, because when we moved in a lot of the original residents in the South Minneapolis neighborhood where I live, they built or bought in the late forties when these houses were built and they were still there. And, uh. My neighbor was the original resident. He knew the people that had lived in my house. And all the people in the neighborhood no longer had children So we came along and started having kids in the eighties and there was not very many kids in the neighborhood. And then. My kids, of course, have grown, moved on. They're in their forties and uh, now the neighborhood is turning over again. Lots of new little kids. It's fun to be able to watch that. It's neat to see the transformation of, of neighborhoods like that. And your busy grandparents with two granddaughters, age four and eight, I know you spend a lot of time with them. You're volunteering in Hiawatha Elementary. What's the life of a grandparent like in this day and age? Well, um, I don't recall being a parent being as much fun as being a grandparent has been. So, um, my, my children might remember things differently than I do, but, uh, it's, it's great being a grandparent. We, uh, we can spoil'em as much as we can. My daughter was just here visiting from Washington DC over the holidays, and she was on hand when we were telling the two granddaughters Go ahead and have another piece of candy. We always let all the kids have all the candy they wanted. And my daughter just looked at me kind of funny and I don't remember that. you actually read my mind. How often is grandparents? It's just a whole different set of rules than it was when you were the parent. And then again, your adult kids are saying, Hey, wait a minute. Where did that come from? Well, we probably didn't keep bowls full of candy bars on the counter when the kids were little. Sure. And your wife Patty was a school teacher in the Minneapolis School District for 45 years. Did you guys, did you both retire in 2018? She retired shortly after I did.'cause she finished her school year and I finished the Grand Lodge Okay. Year, which was April school year, being first part of June. But yes, we retired together. You have a very distinct record in having attended every Grand Lodge in Minnesota, annual communication from 1986 to 2025, but let's back up a step or two further than that. You initially took your degrees in Richfield Lodge number 3 34, raised to a Master Mason in December of 1980. Tell us about the lodge at Richfield at the time that was located where the current Best Buy headquarters are now, right? Yes. It was 76 15 Logan Avenue South. Um, just uh, in the middle of that whole neighborhood, which took probably three or four years. To bring that Best Buy project fruition. There were other plans that fell apart along the way, and everybody in the neighborhood was in limbo. Richfield Lodge and our co-owner Century Lodge, we didn't really want to sell or move, but everybody in the neighborhood, all the homeowners were so tired of waiting. They were, they couldn't sell.'cause nobody would wanna buy knowing that it was gonna get torn down in a year or two. Right? So they, they all wanted to take the buyout. We had no interest in it. But as soon as it became evident that everybody was gonna go along with it, we attended council meetings and, uh, committee meetings trying to, uh. Put our point of view out there, but we, we couldn't, couldn't fight city hall. Literally. We, we did, we did get a very fair offer ultimately, uh, when we did have to sell. But it, it was still not something we wanted to do, And that's not a challenge that most masons would anticipate as officers or member of a lodge that, oh, by the way, the city's going to come in and ultimately bulldoze this entire several miles of property. Right. I of course was no longer an officer of the lodge. I was just a pass master, uh, certainly a active pass master. I stayed active. And, was involved with the committee that we put together to try to resist. And once we figured out we couldn't resist, then we put together a plan to get the best offer we could. Mm-hmm. So we luckily had, a good appraisal done and were able to make that stick. I know you joined the officer line at Richfield. You were Master of the Lodge in 1988, and then Richfield Lodge number 3 34 merged with Cataract number two. You served as Lodge Secretary from oh one to 2025. You're now Secretary Emeritus. You've done a lot. I have a list of your Masonic involvement. That might take a half hour for me to read all the way through, which I'm, I'm not going to do, but did you have a meal at home at all between the eighties and even the few years ago? Well, I, I do recall in the, my final years of being an officer at Richfield. Telling my wife it, you know, it won't be like this once I'm out of office. And then almost immediately I was asked to participate in Grand Lodge activities. I had taken my monitor exams over three years, 86, 87, and 88. And, um, soon as I was a pass master, that was a qualification to be a custodian, and I was tapped for that job, and then I had to explain to my wife, well, I'll have to go maybe once a week to school or something, but once a week max. Well, maybe it's a little more than that. What was a monitor exam like? I hate to say back in the, back in those days, but was it a little more intense than maybe today's, I, I would say it might have been a little more intense. It certainly seemed to me. chairman of the Board of Custodians was a, a gentleman, brother Henry Van Geese. He had been doing that job, I don't know, I think 30 years. A long time. Yeah. He was, uh. In his mid to late eighties when, when I was taking the exams, but I, I took the exams with a good friend and brother Gary Bill we went over together. We figured what's the worst they could do? They could fail us. So what, so we, we went three years in a row and, and, uh, as it is now, um. We would be going through and maybe one of the custodians would stop us and say, oh, that was this. And then the other custodian would say, no, that that was right this way. So it, it's not really changed in that respect. Yes. If you attend a monitored exam today, you might see, uh, some disagreement among the board even. Mm-hmm. what ultimately led to you being asked or brought into the Grand Secretary position? I was, surprised and pleased to be asked to be Grand Treasurer three years earlier, and that brought me to the, uh, corporate board table got to know the Grand Line at that time. Mm-hmm. And they had. Decided in those years when I was grand treasurer, that they were going to move away from the Grand Secretary being the full-time position. They were gonna have an office manager, executive director, and it just didn't work out. So when, Last one didn't work out the way they had hoped it would. They asked me to consider it. I had applied for that position when it was opening up and was not selected, A past grand master was selected and, and I understood that. But this time when, when that one didn't work out, they came to me and said, you know, we would like you to do this this time. And I said. Okay. but I, I felt that the Grand Secretary title was more important than the executive director title when you would go to like the conference of Grand Masters and grand Secretaries. So it was pretty much my idea to put it back into the act of Grand Secretary. That, that it is still today. as I retired from being grand secretary, I had worked my way up into the second longest serving grand Secretary to. The longest serving one at that time was from North Carolina. Good friend Walt Clap, and he had a daughter in high school, so I figured he's not gonna be retiring anytime soon. So I went ahead and pulled the plug. Uh, little did I know Walt left shortly after that. Uh, so I might have made it to the top spot for, for longevity purposes. Yeah. Who was the Grand Secretary of Minnesota before you? Well, the last grand secretary before me was Ray Schlemmer. And Ray, was the one that became the first ceremonial grand secretary as he retired from his active grand secretary job. And that was perhaps two to three years where he was in a ceremonial position. but Ray died of cancer. Leaving the actual grand secretary spot open. And then about that time was when the other person decided to retire and we put the, put it back together. With that position comes so many questions. There's so much institutional knowledge in that. Have you always had an enjoyment of the code and some of the more administrative getting in the weeds of my involvement with the Masonic code was really what brought me. To the attention of the Grand Lodge officers in 1991, I was on the board of Custodians and they had a number of resolutions that year. I think it was maybe 15 or 18. Wow. It was a huge number for Minnesota. That's a big year. But you know, one of the resolutions was to change the definition of unanimous. Concerning balloting to be, no, no more than one. so with all these resolutions, I just sat down with my Masonic code. This was before you could even do a word search I just pointed out all the things that were wrong, and whenever you'd have a discussion about the code, you'd always hear, but there's so many conflicts in the code. And here we were gonna introduce maybe another dozen of them. Yeah. In one fell swoop. And, uh, I, made a list shortly before Grand Lodge, I sent it to the Grand Lodge officers. And, uh, I get called to come to a meeting of the Grand Lodge officers. Now I'm still just a member of the Board of Custodians, not even grand treasurer at the time. What year was this? Approximately 91, I think. Okay. And, uh, they, they wanted to talk to me about my points and ultimately they withdrew several of the resolutions. but that was the, that was the timeframe when the proficiency examination was shortened. Okay. Um, a, a number of, uh, introduced the education segment, the quiz that you'd pass before you would move on to the next degree and so on. And so there was a lot of changes happening right then. They called it the Visions Committee. Visions Committee in 1991. I believe. That was it. So they recognized in you, you had a knowledge and a sense for all of the many moving parts within the code Was, were they just wanting to capitalize on your, your knowledge of that? They, they recognized it. I don't think they all wanted to capitalize on it, but a couple that did, uh, that's how I became chairman of the Jurisprudence Committee. the next year, I think, um, I was put in that position by, past Grand Master Chuck BTOs. Oh, yeah. And, uh, so he, he was one of the ones that recognized that I could read the code, I guess. Yeah. What's a memory you have of a past grandma that maybe some members of today wouldn't remember that brother? that was certainly one of the joys of my career as Grand Secretary and with the Grand Lodge was getting to know so many of them, as people, um, not. Not just as grand masters, right? Not just the office, but the, the per the brother behind the, yes. Right. Um, just to give you an example, When I got married, I sent a wedding invitation to Richard Nixon, he who was president at the time, and Richard and Pat couldn't come to our wedding, but they did send a nice note of regrets, which we still have in our wedding memorabilia. So as I'm becoming master of my lodge. I sent a note to Grandma Ralph Holquist, and lo and behold, he came to my installation and, and this is 1988. 1988. and at the time I felt the same way. Like, if I invite the president, he's not gonna be able to come. Sure. But is it was that that was really the first time that. Oh, they're, they're, they're people. They're, if, if they have the time available, they'll, they'll come. So that kind of thing. Ralph was a, a good friend. He was chairman of the board of custodians and, uh, long time, active past grand. You're a member of so many different Masonic bodies. You've obviously traveled probably the world. What's, what's a memorable trip that you took, whether that was for grand secretaries or maybe Scottish Wright or otherwise? Well, I belonged to many Masonic bodies. Not, not all of them. I, I. Not active in the York. Right. Even though I have membership in the York Right. Bodies, uh, I just had to pick and choose where I could spend my time and, and my time has always been spent in Lodge and Grand Lodge, although I did get active in Scottish, right? I, I had no idea at the time that I would get as active. but I enjoyed the Scottish Rite Degrees and participated in, in a number of them. And my kids were older then, so it didn't matter quite so much that I was being gone as much. And because you were, you were Master of kiddos from 2001. 2002. Yeah, that sounds right. Yep. And that was a either a 12 or a 14 year line at the time. And I, I accepted that shortly after getting out of office in Lodge. I think it might actually been 93. No, it had to be earlier 91. I wasn't grand treasurer yet, but somehow I thought I was not gonna be as active and I would have more time. I probably wouldn't have taken on that along with some of the other things I had if I had to do it over again. Right. Funny how that works though. It we, this is just gonna be a small commitment now that you're finishing that big one and somehow, sometimes it becomes. Duplicate. Well, the Master of Kenosha course is responsible for the 31st and 32nd degrees, and they all come right after each other. Yeah. Sequential. Yeah. There's only two, but they come right away. Bang, bang. And, uh, they're, they're vastly different. And the parts, uh, at the time were even more difficult, I think, than today. They've since changed the degrees around. A fair amount. Mm-hmm. And a lot of the master's part on the Master Kenosha on the 32nd has been distributed to some of the other officers and even the other heads of the bodies that take part in the 32nd. Now, It might go without saying that the sequence of those degrees is a lot because they do happen so quickly. And the cast, the vast amount of memorization in Scottish Rite. That's a lot. Yes. And uh. Again, the, the, the 32nd degree, without going into too much about the degree, it has a variety of, um, parts and lectures that compose the degree. They're not actually lectures, but they're lengthy parts from each of the officers. And, that also generally occurs late April, mid-April, that would always be right. As I was getting ready for Grand Lodge. Oh yeah. Finishing up Grand Lodge and had plenty on my plate from my actual work at that time. Yes. Also, you've been a Mason for 45 years now. What's a favorite memory of any of the many bodies you've been? Is it a degree, is it a trip? Is it a, an experience? What comes to mind on that? Well, I, I, I would probably have to say it was my time spent with my friend Gary Bill, who I credit him. With my even taking the monitors exams, we, we both were pretty good at memorizing the ritual, but Gary's like, we should do this and Oh, okay. but if he hadn't pushed me, I probably wouldn't have gone over and, and taken the test. So we traveled together, we, did a lot of our practice to get ready for the monitor exams together and. Gary and his wife Pat, became very good friends of ours. And, you know, his, his passing, 7, 8, 10 years ago now, I can't remember exactly, but it it, I still miss him. It was, it was, he was one of the best things that happened to me in lodge. time and again, we hear about that one brother gave a nudge, gave an encouragement that you weren't thinking about, I should take this monitor exam. It's intimidating, it's a ton of work and memorization. But with his, Hey, let's do this and then look at the, what that opened up If I hadn't taken the monitors exams, I certainly wouldn't have become a custodian by definition. But that was the door that opened to all my involvement with Grand Lodge activities. And of course, it, it became a huge part of my life. It became my livelihood and, um, it, was definitely a, a life changing experience in that respect. does memorizing come naturally to you, or how do you go about that? What's, what's the, what's your secret? Repetition. Yeah. I don't think it comes naturally anymore. Um. most of what I memorized is still up there someplace, and it's funny how it just, uh, I might not be able to go and give every lecture right now. I could probably go and tell you what's wrong with somebody else. It's, that comes with the it, I know it comes with the past master title, but it, it's funny how I might not be able to do it without some work right now. When you're sitting there and oops, he, he made a little mistake there. And you can't, you can't avoid it because it's in your brain. And, and I don't always point it out, but, but you, but you hear it, it's, it's probably a muscle memory. It, it's like nails on a blackboard. You know, the needle on the record scratching. Yes, exactly. There's a lot of history on the grounds of the Masonic home. Where the Heritage Center now shares space. It goes way back to Marian Savage, the legend of Dan Patch. What was it like when the decision was made to build the Heritage Center and research that? How, how monumental did that feel in the moment? What, in what year would that have been too? 2013, somewhere in there. Uh, of course Jim Christensen was grandma when we laid the cornerstone. Uh, but it was a couple years to getting to that point. as far as the Heritage Center goes, it was, um. Such a lengthy project because we tried to examine some of the other great Masonic buildings, uh, around the country. Um. Certainly the Detroit Masonic Temple. Did you go there? We, we, we did, uh, take a field trip. Field trip to Detroit, past Grand Master Eric Niton beak, of course, as chairman of charities Board was really instrumental in. In all of the building of the Heritage Center. But so I, I would accompany him, I believe John s Stadel went along at that time. Wendy Wozniak, she was doing some of the, decorating ideas, um, based on her knowledge of scenery. That's so great. There's so much knowledge there. It's incredible. Um, we, we visited the new, newer, uh, Scottish Rite Temple in Chicago. you just looking for ideas. You were en visiting these places and saying, Hey, we should, we should take this little detail. We wanted to, we wanted to pick the best, but we also wanted to make sure it stayed a Masonic building and. Some of the buildings we visited, they seemed to be building the newer buildings to be more multipurpose. Yeah. And not necessarily just Masonic. And certainly our heritage center might fit that description with the beautiful auditorium and the museum. But these were all designed to, to work together. You retired from full-time employments and were elected Grand Secretary Emeritus in April of 2018. How do you go from a schedule as busy as you had both professionally, Mason and your family? Well, I thought that I could do the most good for Grand Lodge still if I was a candidate for Grand Treasurer again for a few years after I left the Office of Grand Secretary. So that transition, I think. Maybe helped our current grand secretary get his feet on the ground a little bit more solidly. Keith might not remember it that way. I tried not to be too, um, too much into his business, but I was more available that way. I was still involved with the finances of Grand Logic course, and I had. Very intimate knowledge of how that all works. for me anyway, it, it helped me have a transitional withdrawal, out of my active day-to-day activities. But even after that, I'm still involved, have been involved in committees, uh, trial commissioner, jurisprudence, So now that you have some free time, you're reading, traveling, you're a Harley guy? I have been a Harley guy since, uh, 97, I believe. Uh, when I bought my first Harley, I still have my motorcycle from when I was a junior in high school. What kind was it? Uh, Kawasaki. three 50. Not quite as powerful as the Harleys are today, but I am still in the process of trying to restore that, which I'm not overly mechanically inclined. So it's, it's been a, a lengthy process. Sure. It's, it's been parked for 50 years. Still working on, still pecking away, but I do enjoy my, I take an annual trip with a good friend from Germany and we've been all over the United States. We've done the, pretty much the length of Route 66, taken the Highway 83 from. The Texas Mexico border all the way to north of Minot. Wow. And, uh, great routes across the United States we've done on Harley's together, it's, it's a great time. What's it like when bad weather rolls in? All we think of when you hear that is sunshine in perfect conditions. But you must be, you have to be ready for anything. We, we certainly carry, um, rain gear and when you're trying to make 500 miles a day or four 50 miles a day, you, you really can't sit and wait for the rain to stop. So you put on your rain gear and if, if we're really prescient, but put it on before it rains. Yeah.'cause uh, it gets a little harder to put on when you're, when you have to putting a rubber suit on and you're already wet. Oh. Well, and you were out doing that before GPS and before all of these technological advancements that make directions so much easier. Maps. Yes. Um, but I have a love for maps too. You do. So I, I, as I would travel, I would always have a paper map on my lap. Drove my wife crazy. I I no longer do that.'cause you got GPS all over everything. Good man. Um, but a cartographer, you're, you're into that. I, I've always enjoyed map reading. And maybe two weeks ago I saw that, uh, there's a new helmet coming out that's gonna have HUD in it heads up display, which I have in my current car. It flashes on your windshield, the things on your dash. Now the biggest problem on riding on a motorcycle with the visor down. Yeah. You might have sunglasses on, you got the visor, you got your phone in a, in a carrier. But if you're trying to follow the map on that, uh, depending on the glare, it, it's not always easy to do. So I'm looking forward to this heads up display that's gonna appear on the helmet. Visor seems like there's a little risk of distraction, like you said, is sunglasses on it's glare. You're looking and, and that from what I've read about it, it's designed to, to look like it's 12 feet out in front of you, so it's not gonna be right in your eyes. Uh, I've only had it in my car now for a couple months. it didn't take very long to get used to it. It's, it's kind of nifty. It has your turn by turn instructions. They pop up. So instead of having to look over to the side to your navigation screen, I don't like the nav squawking at me, so I turn that part off. But you still might need the visual clues. So convenient. Now do we take that? We probably take that for granted. I think it's, so What's your favorite time of year and why? Well, I guess probably summer. Um, I assumed as much You're a Harley guy between the motorcycle, which, uh, I do the one big trip every year and, and I might use it for some little trips. Maybe go visit Steve Johnson and Winthrop or something. Mm-hmm. For lunch. But, uh, I don't ride it quite as much, uh, except for on the long trips, but. With the lake place and being able to do some boating and, just enjoy the time up there, especially with the grandkids now, it, it's, it's a great time of year. what do people often misunderstand about you? perhaps my sense of humor, it's can be a little bit dry. It might hit'em a minute later that, oh, that was funny, wasn't it? Delayed reactions. Yes. Yeah. Was there a most memorable thing about being grand Secretary for you? I know you have a lot of memories, but does anything stand out? I would have to say it was just. The people I met, and I'm not talking just the past grand Masters or the grand line officers. Uh, I know people in. Almost every town in Minnesota when you stop and think about it, certainly every town that had a lodge, knowing the secretaries, is an instant in. And while I perhaps didn't recognize them all, if in person, if they didn't come to Grand Lodge every year, but many of them did. And just knowing all those people around the state, not. For what they could do for me or what I could do for them. But just knowing that you know somebody every place that's, I think that's a big deal, and it was to me, Douglas J. Campbell, grand Secretary Emeritus of the Grand Lodge, Minnesota. I feel like we could talk for hours and hours and hours about the many things that you've experienced. Not only within the Masonic family, but but elsewhere in life. But really appreciate you coming by and being our guest. Well, I really appreciate you asking me, Reid. I was a little apprehensive. Um, I got so many memories that it's, it's hard to say this one should be included and not this one. but it's, it's been great talking to you. Thank you.