COVINGTON – For more than a half-century, the massive, granite-trimmed white stone Scottish Rite building on this city’s East Side was the hot spot for Masonic lodge members.

When the building at 1553 Madison Avenue was completed in 1956, more than 1,100 Scottish Rite members from Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana attended a four-day spring reunion there.

“In its heyday, it was the place to be,” said Fred Bryant, secretary of the Covington Scottish Rite.

But rising operating costs and a need for a smaller building that would help it better fulfill its mission of providing charitable services to the community have prompted the fraternity to try to sell the landmark 72,525-square-foot, three-floor structure.

Bryant hopes the building is sold soon because his fraternity needs the money to build a new facility in Kenton County near Interstate 275 to make it more accessible to members.

He said a new building would be half the size of the current building and is mainly being built to provide space for Rite Care, the group’s charitable program that provides therapy for underprivileged pre-school children with speech and language disorders.

He said the group now pays Cardinal Health in Florence to operate Rite Care.

The group has not selected a site yet for its new building.

“The current building would not allow the fraternity to convert the building and have an on-site Rite Care clinic without extensive renovations,” Bryant said. “It’s more cost-effective for us to sell and open a clinic in the new building.”

He said the building is not being sold because of lack of use or falling membership.

Bryant said his fraternity now has about 2,500 members, a figure that has remained fairly steady in recent years.

The organization filled its velvet-seat auditorium with an average attendance of 500 member candidates and active members twice a year until the mid 1970s. Now, the group typically draws 100 potential and active members to its events.

Don Yankey, grandmaster of the Grand Lodge of Kentucky in Louisville, a Masonic fraternity with 406 lodges statewide, said Masonic lodges in general the past few years have lost membership for several reasons, including death and declining interest, causing many of them to sell their lodge buildings.

He said the current trend is occurring even as overall lodge membership has started to pick up again in recent years.

“Some of the buildings within our group in many cases are being sold or consolidated into single offices because of the high cost to upkeep them,” Yankey said.

The Covington Scottish Rite even grew so popular that Col. Harland Sanders, the legendary founder of Kentucky Fried Chicken, joined as a member in 1965, Bryant said.

The creator of the “finger-lickin’ good” chicken donated an oven, stove and other appliances that remain in the building’s restaurant-type kitchen.

Over the years, many public figures have spoken at the building, including former well-known Kentucky politicians like Jim Bunning, Burt T. Combs and M. Gene Snyder. Combs and Snyder also became members.

Bryant figures more than 1,500 meetings have been held at the building, also known as the Scottish Rite Temple. The Covington Scottish Rite is among four separate bodies of the organization in Kentucky, with the others in Louisville, Lexington and Madisonville.

The building is listed for sale at $850,000, down from its initial asking price of $995,000 around August 2010 to boost the number of potential buyers, said David Knock, the listing broker for Century 21 Stellar Real Estate in Florence and a Scottish Rite member.

Among the building’s features: A giant basement that can serve as a ballroom or reception hall and a 700-plus seat auditorium that could accommodate plays or musicals.

The building is still used for monthly meetings by six local Masonic groups and meetings and events by the Scottish Rite.

The building features door knobs with the engraved double-headed eagle Scottish Rite emblem. A red, white and blue-framed portrait of George Washington painted by Mel Tillis, the American country singer, hangs in the foyer. Two huge Sphinx-like statues overlook the entrance way.

The building includes a “blue room” and “red room” for Masonic meetings and a replica of the Liberty Bell in the foyer.

Knock says the building could be used for multiple purposes by religious groups, promotional firms, performing arts groups and for office space. He said the lack of parking at the site and the surrounding area has presented a challenge in selling the property.

The sale also comes when the outlook for activity in the commercial real estate market in general is uncertain given the slow economic recovery.

He estimates that about 10 potential buyers have viewed the property.

“Despite the current economic conditions, we continue to solicit for an end user,” Knock said.