were touched off by charges leveled against John Freeman, an Indianapolis house painter wrongfully accused of being a runaway slave. On September 19, 1859, Abraham Lincoln gave a speech at the Temple (the second of three he ultimately made in Indianapolis during his career). He opened his political remarks by recalling his famous words: “This government cannot endure permanently, half slave and half free; that a house divided against itself cannot stand.” Indianapolis Masonic Hall of 1875 The first temple suffered from serious construction defects and was demolished in 1873. It was replaced by an imposing red-brick Romanesque structure on the same corner, officially opened in 1875. The second temple was designed with ample rental space on the first two floors to generate income. Renters would eventually include a cleaners and a Turkish bath, along with several offices. There were ceremonial and social rooms for five Masonic lodges on the upper floors. However, late in the design process it was noted with great alarm by the state's Masons that the architects had neglected to create an appropriately large meeting hall for the annual meetings of hundreds of lodge officers each year. The Grand Lodge was forced to hurriedly purchase an adjoining lot immediately to the south to attach an architecturally incongruous assembly hall to the backside of the building. After an initial estimate of under $70,000, the total cost of the project was $120,000. The embarrassing errors and cost overruns, combined with the great economic Panic of 1873 nearly bankrupted the Grand Lodge. Indianapolis Masonic Temple of 1909 The Masons and the economy eventually rebounded, and by 1900 there were eight Indianapolis Masonic lodges and numerous appendant groups that had filled the second building beyond its designed capacity. Following a devastating fire in the second temple in 1905, it was determined that a new building at a different location needed to be constructed. Elias J. Jacoby, an attorney and insurance executive, and a very prominent Mason, helped found the Indianapolis Masonic Temple Association and chaired its building committee. The committee hired the firm of Rubush & Hunter, which has been called "the premier Indianapolis architectural firm of the early 20th Century", to design the new structure. The firm, headed by Indiana natives Preston C. Rubush and Edgar O. Hunter, were largely responsible for the look of Indianapolis during this period of the city's history, at the height of the City