The Freemasons were officially founded in London on June 4, 1717.
Contrary to some conspiratorial tales, the Freemasons are not a secret society of assassins. They do not have Cesare Borgia’s head preserved in an urn filled with grappa. They were not responsible for the French Revolution. They did not kidnap Anastasia Romanov. They are not in control of the Hale-Bopp comet. And they most certainly did not invent horseradish.
They were, however, masters of masonry—and they ushered in a golden age of making things out of rocks.
Freemasons first appeared in England and Scotland in the 1300s, not long after the first sighting of the Loch Ness Monster but well before the advent of crop circles. Most laborers of the era were tied to their land and thus prohibited from traveling. However, stone masons—whose work on cathedrals, churches, and grand piles of rocks required specialized training and large teams—were granted the freedom to travel. These traveling stone workers became known as Freemasons, and their curious lunchboxes came to be known as mason jars.
Whenever the Freemasons arrived in a town to start work on a new project, they set up a communal area to meet, receive pay, get food, train apprentices, rest, and—of course—get roaring drunk. These meeting places became known as lodges.
As the centuries rolled on, the Freemasons did less and less rock work and more and more socializing at the lodges. Today, the Freemasons are a friendly social organization with a secret handshake, which—according to some conspiracy theorists—means they’re responsible for selling out the governments of the world to an invading extraterrestrial army.
The Haus of Dcaligari 