Brooklyn Mechanics remember ‘Quintessential Professor’

The Most Worshipful Grand Master of the Executive Committee of the Grand Council of the Brooklyn-headquartered Independent United Order of Mechanics, Friendly Society, Western Hemisphere, Inc. has paid tribute to Councilor Chester Crichton Robinson, remembering him as a “quintessential professor.”

Costa Rican-born Robinson died on Jan. 1, 2022 in Brooklyn. He was 96.

“He had a tremendous presence wherever he was, and, because of that aura, he was a ‘professor’ to the Independent United Order of Mechanics, and was a long-time educator to our members about Mechanism,” Jamaican-born Grand Master Collins told Caribbean Life exclusively over the weekend.

“Personally, I felt a great loss of his passing due to the fact that I have benefited so much from his teaching about Mechanics; and, particularly, during his final years, I have been speaking with him on the phone,” he added. “Councilor Chester Robinson was the quintessential professor of Mechanism. He was tough, morally strong and was self-contained. He was Mechanism.

“Mechanism is a peculiar system of morality,” continued Collins, stating that Robinson will be solely missed.

According to a joint statement, signed by Grand Master Collins and Executive Secretary, Cecilio H. Leacock, Robinson was born on June 2, 1926, in Limon, Costa Rica.

He was initiated into the Independent United Order of Mechanics Western Hemisphere, Inc. and, at 27, he migrated to the United States.

In the US, he was affiliated with the now defunct Morning Star Lodge#2 in Brooklyn, and later, in 1985, transferred his membership to Sunbeam Lodge, both under the auspices of the Composite District Grand Lodge #2.

Robinson quickly moved up the Ranks of the Morning Star Lodge #2, becoming its leader, the Illustrative Grand.

In 1974, he became Grand Master of Composite District Grand Lodge#2.

That same year, Councilor Robinson was elected at the Triennial International Convention of Grand Council as Grand Trustee, and was elected Grand Treasurer in 1980 in New York.

Robinson was manager of the Order’s World Headquarters Building at 65 Putnam Ave. in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn.

In 1998, the title of Executive Life Member was conferred on Robinson at the Triennial International Convention in Ft. Lauderdale, Fl. by the then Grand Master of the Order, the Rt. Hon. Winston Anthony Jones.

Funeral service for Robinson was held on Jan. 10 at St. Peter Claver Roman Catholic Church in Bedford-Stuyvesant, where Robinson was a congregant.

He was interred at Saint Charles Cemetery in Farmingdale, Suffolk County, Long Island.