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N ARABIC ORDER 
MYSTIC SHRINE

[[image - black and white photograph of Shriners convention]]

[[image - black and white photograph of L. L. Melton]]
[[caption]] L. L. MELTON Deputy Imperial Potentate [[/caption]]

Miss Amelia Joyce Hodges, the 1975 National Shrine Queen. The lovely Miss Hodges from Los Angeles, Calif., won the first place prize of a $2,500 scholarship in the 1975 annual Prince Hall Shrine talent and scholarship pageant contest, held last year in New Orleans, La., winning out over 15 other contestants from all over the world. She was sponsored by Egyptian Temple and Court 5 and had previously emerged victorious in talent competition on the local, state, and regional level.

A student at West Los Angeles College and a member of the Los Angeles, Calif., Opera Company, Miss Hodges said that she will use her scholarship funds to further her studies in music. She is a member of First African Methodist Episcopal Church where she is a member of the cathedral and youth choirs. Her hobbies are biking, cooking, horseback riding, reading, singing and swimming. She is the daughter of Mrs. Lou Nette Hodges of Ridgely Drive in Los Angeles.

In an interview held recently, Imperial Potentate Johnson said that the youth of our nation ware always well represented at our annual Imperial council session. Programs of activities, designed especially for them, will be held as always in Los Angeles. These will include but not be limited to basketball, bowling, swimming, track and field competition; male youth and female (Isiserettes) drill team competition; mini-bike races; marching and mounted patrols; exhibitions of all sorts and an all-day picnic in one of the largest parks in the city.

The Imperial Potentate is strong on the fact that all members of the fraternal order must project a strong effort in the involvement of young people in the area of community life today if we are to succeed. He noted that the Imperial Council of Shriners are always on record for projecting a strong program  of social action for youths in order to assist local, state, and national law enforcement agencies to eradicate crime, delinquency and poverty from the streets of our cities and towns in this day and time.

"The strong members of all black fraternal orders must bear the infirmities of those who are weak, both in and out of the accepted society if we are to survive," The Imperial Potentate said.

The council and court also give financial grants to young men and women, worldwide, to attend institutions of higher learning to further their formal education; to prestigious organizations such as the United Negro College Fund, health and research centers throughout the USA and to the National NAACP and its legal defense fund, to assist them in developing educational programs and in upgrading academic and scholastic achievements.

In addition to donations made by local clubs, courts, and temples on almost a monthly basis totaling well over $2 millions of dollars annually., our national charities, including those administered by the Prince Hall Shrine Health and Medical Research Foundation, make annual donations amounting to more than a million dollars as of this year, to colleges, universities, and hospitals for medical research.

He further added that Prince Hall Shriners and Daughters of Isis members believe that their 83 years of heritage has been rich in traditions, customs, and accomplishments and is unequal by any other fraternal order in the world interms of charity, benevolence, and aid.

Prince Hall Shriners, called "Nobles," and members of the women's auxiliary called "Daughters," are numbered among the nearly 40,000 membership in the 350 temples and courts all over the world. This group represents a membership of nearly 350,000 Prince Hall Masons and Sisters in appendant and adoptive rite bodies of the order worldwide.

The criteria for membership in Prince Hall shrinedom is that you must be a Prince Hall mason, holding membership in one or more of the appendant bodies of the family of masons.

The criteria for membership in the Prince Hall court is also very simple. You must be the daughter, mother, sister, widow, or wife of a Prince Hall Shriner, who is also a Prince Hall mason.

Unlike many of its predecessors or contemporary fraternal bodies, the Prince Hall organization accepts membership with no regard to race, color, or creed.

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