Although he had peppered the Book of Mormon with anti-Masonic strictures stemming from the Morgan hysteria, he had long since lost his hostility to the craft. Masonry was now as respectable as before 1827, and when Judge James Adams, Deputy Grand Master of the Illinois Masonic Order, urged him to set up a lodge in Nauvoo, he complied at once. The lodge was formally installed on March 15, 1842, with headquarters in the big room over Joseph’s store.
