The first issue of MQ, published
in April 2002, featured an
interview with the Grand Master
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As you will have read in the Pro Grand
Master’s speech (p6) and the editorial (p4),
MQ Magazine and Freemasonry Today are
to merge at the end of the year and Grand
Lodge’s house magazine will re-emerge
in January under the title of Freemasonry
Today with a new editor and under new
management.
MQ Magazine was born out of a
discussion between the then Grand
Secretary, James Daniel, John Hamill and
Colonel Michael Dewar, who had just
been appointed Grand Lodge’s public
relations consultant.
They submitted to the Board of General
Purposes a project to replace the Grand
Secretary’s Quarterly Newsletter with a quality
magazine which would not only report on
the meetings of Grand Lodge and Supreme
Grand Chapter and the work of the national
Masonic Charities, but would also carry
other national Masonic news and articles
of general Masonic interest.
The Newsletter had been posted in bulk to
Lodge secretaries for onward transmission to
members but often did not reach them. The
brave decision was taken to recommend that
the new magazine be mailed direct to each
subscribing member under the United
Grand Lodge of England.
A brave decision because, at the time,
Grand Lodge did not have a data base of
addresses for all members as, up to that
point, it had never had reason for direct
contact with each member, and so a new
data base of potentially 300,000 names and
addresses would have to be constructed
from scratch.
The Board of General Purposes agreed
the project. Michael Dewar was asked to
publish the magazine on behalf of Grand
Lodge. John Hamill was appointed editorial
director and John Jackson was appointed
editor, to which post he brought a wealth
of experience and skill setting high standards
for content and style.
Initially it was agreed that the magazine
should follow a lifestyle format and include
articles of general interest as well as Masonic.
The first issue was published on 1 April 2002
and had the great cachet of an extended
interview with the MW The Grand Master.
After the first year it was decided to
‘test the waters’ and a survey of readers was
carried out. This showed that the readers
wanted more Masonic content so the
lifestyle format was dropped, retaining
only the travel and gardening features and
book reviews which had proved popular
with readers.
After Issue No. 8 it was decided to bring
the magazine ‘in house’ and Michael Dewar
and his team, who had done so much to get
the magazine successfully off the ground,
ceased connection with the magazine but
remained as Grand Lodge’s PR consultancy.
To publish the magazine the board
formed a company – Grand Lodge
Publications Ltd. Nigel Buchanan, then
Grand Treasurer, became chairman, John
Hamill company secretary and Nicholas
Hart, Geoffrey Baber and David Wilkinson
were invited to be directors. They were later
joined by Barry Ross and Graham Rudd.
Paul Stancliffe, who had been advising
the Grand Charity on printing and
publication matters, was brought in as a
consultant to find designers, printers and a
distribution house. As a result, Polestar were
taken on as the main printer and distributor,
Park Communications to produce the
covers and do the repro work and a new
young design group – John Morgan Studio –
produced a design concept which won
them the contract as designers.
It soon became apparent that the affairs
of the company required someone with a
financial background to manage the day to
day finances and the Grand Charity agreed
to second their finance manager, Suhail
Alam, to cover this task with Grand Lodge’s
director of finance Nicola Graham Adriani,
giving support and advice.
Suhail also proved adept at getting good –
and lucrative – advertising, and has
continued to do so with Ten Alps since
they were appointed to manage advertising
for the magazine.
The brave decision to mail the magazine
to every member gave birth to an initial
nightmare – the construction of the address
database. With help from the Registration
Department in Freemasons’ Hall, input
from London and the Provinces and support
from Codestorm, originally taken on as
distributors of the magazine, the mammoth
task was completed – not without a few
hiccups for the early issues.
John McCoy was brought in to audit
the system and has continued to audit the
mailing list for each issue. As a result, the
magazine was reaching more than 243,000
brethren resident in England and Wales.
Initially the magazine was to have been
sent to all subscribing members of Lodges
under the United Grand Lodge of England,
wherever they lived, but the cost proved
astronomical.
A web site was developed, by Mark
Griffin, on which the content of each issue
became available to anyone who tapped
www.mqmagazine.co.uk into their search
engine. Content could be read on screen
or downloaded and the site has proved
very popular.
MQ is now five years old and is about
to move in a new direction under a new
team. Thanks are due to all who have been
involved from the original idea to this the
final issue in its present form.
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