When you think of secret societies, you may imagine shadowy cabals of men pulling the strings of power and conspiring to take over the world.  They might be the stock villains of conspiracy theories, Hollywood movies and Dan Brown novels, but few, if any, employ cloaks and daggers to achieve their aims.  Although there is a tendency to malign or distrust them, some secret societies are more benevolent than you might expect, less Men in Black and more like your local community center.  You’re probably already familiar with the Freemasons and the Illuminati, but there exists a group far less known to the public, one that claims D.C. as its home base, and the nation’s darkest years as the era of its birth.

By the winter of 1858–59, the Civil War would not begin for nearly another three years, but hardly anyone could ignore the division that was fracturing the country, even in the tiny rural town of Eagle Harbor, Michigan.1  Justus Henry Rathbone was a 19-year-old schoolteacher who watched the hatred and violence that roiled the nation not just with fear, but with a tragic sense of grief that America had lost the bonds that held its citizens together.2 

The passionate music composer and actor found comfort in a play he directed, written by the Irish poet John Banim and based on the Greek legend of Damon and Pythias.  The story goes like this: Damon is accused of plotting against the tyrannical Dionysius I and sentenced to death.  Damon’s friend Pythias begs Dionysius to grant his friend a temporary release to say goodbye to his family.  Pythias volunteers to be held hostage in Damon’s place.  Should Damon not return, Pythias will be executed in his place.  Dionysius is convinced Damon will not return, but when he does to save his friend, Dionysius is so astonished by the strength of their friendship, that he frees them both.  It’s a simple story of two men willing to die for one another, a story of loyalty, nobility, and most of all brotherhood, that Rathbone felt was sorely missing from his country.3 

While teaching in Michigan, he authored the ritual for a fraternal order that Rathbone believed would bring “brotherly love” back to America.  His order’s motto and mission would be to “disseminate the great principles of friendship, charity and benevolence”, while upholding the precepts of “toleration in religion, obedience to law, and loyalty to government.”4

He sat on his ideas until early 1864, after he built a circle of friends working as a federal clerk in D.C., all of whom were enamored with his proposed order.  On February 15, the 25-year-old Rathbone gathered his friends at 914 E Street, N.W., where the J. Edgar Hoover Building stands today.  One of the participants wrote an account of the meeting.

“After thus organizing the meeting, Brother Rathbone arose and made a further statement that the purpose of the meeting was for the organization of a secret order, having for its object, friendship, benevolence and charity.  Then the necessary oath was read by Brother Rathbone and administered to them.  Rathbone was elected to head the new organization and eight other officers were chosen.  Few, if any of us, present on that memorable occasion pictured to their minds what would be the result."5    

Today, a plaque stands at the north side of the FBI Headquarters that commemorates the order’s founding.6

On February 19, Rathbone declared Marinis Hall at Pennsylvania Avenue and 9^th St N.W. as Washington Lodge #1, the first lodge of the Knights of Pythias.7  But for all its grand ceremony and idealism, Rathbone initially didn’t intend for the order to include anyone beyond his circle of friends.  His lack of ambition and an internal rivalry with another member led to Rathbone’s resignation.  He turned his attention towards his growing family and career as a clerk.  The Knights of Pythias would move on without him.8   

The founding members devised a three-tiered structure to the order.  Subordinate Lodges are the lowest tier, usually located in cities, though they used to be informally referred to as Pythian Castles.  And yes, many of the lodges really do look like castles.   They serve as weekly meeting places and administrative centers for Pythian officers, while also housing businesses and offices for other organizations.9  Some, like the Pythian Castle in Arcata, California have been added to the National Register of Historic Places.10

The Grand Lodges are the second-highest tier, and manage Pythian activities at the state and provincial level.  Rathbone founded The Grand Lodge of the District of Columbia in April 1864.  

The Supreme Lodge is the final tier, the headquarters of the national organization and seat of power for the Supreme Chancellor.11  Today, the Supreme Lodge is based in Stoughton, Massachusetts.12  

As if following the Game of Thrones playbook, officials have names like Keeper of the Records and Seal, Master at Arms and Inner Guard.  Members rise through the ranks by becoming Pages, Esquires and Knights.  

In the olden days, to fill one of the knightly ranks you had to endure some pretty bizarre rituals.  Candidates for the rank of Knights were led to believe they had to jump barefoot onto a spiked board.  But these rituals were really more bark than bite.  The spikes were removed or replaced with rubber spikes.  Other initiation rituals involved a new member being granted a ceremonial sword, inscribed with the initials FCB, for friendship, charity and benevolence.13  Rathbone’s pocket Bible continues to serve as the most valuable artifact in the order.  Thousands of initiates attend “Rathbone Bible Class”, which is a welcome ceremony to the order.14   

The Knights of Pythias grew slowly.  By June 1866 just four new lodges had opened, and Washington Lodge #1 had already been shuttered.  After years of fits and starts, the order finally began to pick up steam in the late 1860s.  An incredible 54,000 members joined by 1869, to be doubled to 100,000 by 1874.  Lodges opened as far west as California and as far south as Georgia.  By late 1869, Canada and the Philippines opened lodges.  The Knights of Pythias become a global movement.   

The Pythians’ message of “brotherly love” in the aftermath of the Civil War was perhaps the most crucial factor to the order’s growth.  America felt a collective necessity to heal the divisions between North and South after the apocalyptic violence and hatred of the Civil War.  Pythian lodges opened in Northern and Southern cities alike, symbolizing the nation’s reforging of unity under a single banner.15        

But the Pythians’ proudest accomplishment came in 1868.  When President Abraham Lincoln heard about the order, he said, “The purposes of your organization are most wonderful.  If we could but bring its spirit to all our citizenry, what a wonderful thing it would be.  It breathes the spirit of Friendship, Charity and Benevolence.  It is one of the best agencies conceived for the upholding of government, honoring the flag, for the reuniting of our brethren of the North and of the South, for teaching the people to love one another, and portraying the sanctity of the home and loved ones.”16   

Lincoln then advised the order to ask Congress for a charter to organize on a national scale.  In 1868, the Knights of Pythias became the first fraternal organization to be chartered by Congress.  On August 11 that same year, Rathbone and the original members established a Supreme Lodge in D.C., the highest tier that served as the headquarters of the organization for the U.S. and Canada.17  

The Knights of Pythias transcended its original purpose of bringing brotherhood back to America amidst the polarization of the Civil War.  Unlike the secret societies of movies and comic books, the Knights of Pythias offered no promises of access to hidden knowledge or power.  Despite its rituals and medieval pretenses, its activities were and continue to be hardly any different from your local neighborhood volunteer organizations.  According to its website, “The real common thread throughout the Knights of Pythias involves our commitment to helping people; when asked what we do, we simply answer: We volunteer! We help people! This common thread shows itself in everything we do. If someone approaches a Pythian and asks what we do, a Pythian simply lists what our order and the Pythian's home lodge do and asks them if they want to help volunteer.”  At the center of the order’s philosophy is Pythianism, “the practical application of religious and charitable principles to everyday life.”18         

As the order grew away from the Civil War and D.C., it once again distanced itself from its founding father.  Justus Rathbone fell out of favor with the Supreme Lodge over a number of disputes concerning how the order should be organized and led.  He resigned from the Knights of Pythias in 1869 at the end of a lengthy and exhaustive battle partly over his attempt to create a splinter order from the organization, with a plan that the Supreme Lodge fiercely rejected.19

After some debate within the order’s upper echelons, his membership was reinstated in 1874, in the role of Supreme Lecturer.  He toured lodges around the country and lectured on the order’s history and philosophy.  He fell into dire financial straits by 1884 and died in 1889 at age 50.  Despite their contentious relationship, the order officially honored him as the founder of the Knights of Pythias that same year.20  A monument was erected in 1892 at his grave site in New York, and still stands there today.21                                                     

The order has attracted politicians, artists and athletes throughout the last 160 years, including Louis Armstrong,22 President Franklin Roosevelt,23 and current Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer.24  Early in the 20th century, it had achieved such mainstream status that in the Groucho Marx movie Animal Crackers, when Captain Spaulding recounts his hunting safari in Africa, he says, “The principal animals in Africa are moose, elks, and Knights of Pythias.”25  

Given this esteemed list of members, you may wonder, who is eligible to join the Knights of Pythias.  Its official charter states that you have to be at least 18, and willing to uphold the tenets of the following oath:

“I declare upon honor that I believe in a Supreme Being, that I am not a professional gambler, or unlawfully engaged in the wholesale or retail sale of intoxicating liquors or narcotics, and that I believe in the maintenance of the order and the upholding of constituted authority in the government in which I live. Moreover, I declare upon honor that I am not a Communist or Fascist; that I do not advocate nor am I a member of any organization that advocates the overthrow of the Government of the Country of which I am a Citizen, by force or violence or other unlawful means; and that I do not seek by force or violence to deny to other persons their rights under the laws of such country.”26 

There was a darker side to the idealistic appeals espoused by the order.  In 1869, the Supreme Lodge received an application for a new lodge “from a number of colored gentlemen in Philadelphia.”27  At the annual meeting of the Supreme Lodge, the same meeting where Rathbone conceded his controversial idea to form a splinter order, high-ranking members voted 24 to 13 to forbid the Black applicants from joining the order.  Rathbone was one of the thirteen.  He resigned the next day.  Early in the order’s history, women were also excluded from membership.  These groups, however, sought to reform its exclusionary policies.28  

In 1888 the Supreme Lodge approved the formation of an auxiliary order that women could join, but aspiring female Pythians were split over two different rituals.  Curiously, one ritual was written by a man named Joseph Addison Hill, while the other was written by Alva A. Young.  The rituals’ unresolved differences led to two auxiliary orders: the Pythian Sisters of the World based in Indiana, and the Pythian Sisterhood based in New Hampshire.  Ironically, Young’s group initially didn’t accept male members, but sadly neither did they welcome non-whites.  By 1906, the two orders merged into the Pythian Sisters, with a similar structure to the international order.29     

Alternative Pythian organizations sprang up constantly in the order’s first decades.  In 1880 African Americans established the Colored Knights of Pythias in Mississippi.  The proliferation of orders became unwieldy, and some were quickly folded back into the main order.  However, many auxiliary orders remain.30  Today, the Knights of Pythias is an international organization with over 2,000 lodges around the United States, Canada and Europe and about 50,000 members.31

The Knights of Pythias continues charitable work, primarily raising money for the American Cancer Society.32  D.C. carries few reminders of the order that rose to international prominence from its center.  However, in 2019 the Pythians took to Facebook to announce their interest in reviving the order and opening new lodges in the D.C. metro area.33  By embracing social media and warily observing the resurgence of bitter division in our country, the secret society may soon be ready to step out of the shadows once more.  Who knows?  You could even make yourself a part of D.C. history by earning a sword and calling yourself a Knight of Pythias.