Norman B. Spencer (1891–1968) was born at Auckland, New Zealand and qualified from the University of New Zealand with an LLB in 1914. During World War I he served in Egypt and France and upon his return joined his father’s law practice from which he retired in 1951 due to ill health.

Outside his legal practice he held several company directorships, was President of the Auckland Chamber of Commerce and a member of the Senate of the University of New Zealand. In 1963 he was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE). As his obituary by Harry Carr in Volume 80  of AQC records, Spencer’s was ‘a life of stupendous activity often carried through under the disabilities of serious ill-health…’ and his Masonic life was as full as his non-Masonic one.

Bro. Spencer was initiated in Remuera Lodge, No. 1710 (EC) in 1921, appointed District Grand Warden in 1937, and received Grand Rank (New Zealand Constitution) in 1938. He joined United Masters Lodge, No. 167 (NZC) in 1928 and was WM in 1933. He was a founder of six lodges, Grand Lecturer in 1934, President of the Board of General Purposes in 1940/1, SGW in 1950 and in 1960 was awarded the rank of Past Pro Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of New Zealand. In the Grand Lodge of England he was appointed PAGDC in 1938, Past Grand Deacon in 1953 and received the Order of Service to Freemasonry, only the 17^th awarded, in 1959. His biography,  ‘Norman B Spencer, Citizen, Humanitarian, Freemason’. by J. P. Glennie was published in 1972.

Norman Spencer joined the Quatuor Coronati Correspondence Circle in 1927 and was invited to become a full member of Quatuor Coronati Lodge, No. 2076 in 1951 and served as Master for the year 1959-60. Bro. Harry Carr, in proposing Bro Spencer’s health at the Festive Board after his Installation, praised ‘his splendid work in the field of Masonic Education by means of the simple “Question and Answer” material that he was producing in the Transactions of the United Masters Lodge No. 167 (NZC). It is work which has served as a model (especially in its simplicity) for our own more extensive publications in the Q.C. Transactions, and we in QC are deeply indebted to him for the example that he set’. See ’Who Wrote our Ritual‘ as a sample of Spencer’s writing.

Volume 81 of AQC records on page 316 the arrangements for the Norman B. Spencer Prize Essay, and the award of the sum of £50 (now £100) to the winner with the following opening paragraph: ‘Arising out of the bequest to the Lodge by the late Bro Norman B Spencer of New Zealand, who was Master of the Lodge 1959–60, the Standing Committee has resolved to establish a “Norman B. Spencer Prize Essay Award”, which will be open to all individual members of the Correspondence Circle of the Quatuor Coronati Lodge.

Thus came into being the Lodge’s only award named after an  individual member, and it has been regularly awarded since 1970.

Credits and thanks for text, downloads and photos: United Masters Lodge No. 167 (NZC)