Theodore Roosevelt, Freemasons, Concatenated Order of Hoo-Hoo

The Theodore Roosevelt Center has digitized many of the 26th president's letters — some of which reference his Masonic activities.

President Roosevelt addressed the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania in 1902 on the anniversary of Washington's initiation. In his speech, he reflected on some of his own reasons for joining the Freemasons:

"One of the things that attracted me so greatly to Masonry, that I hailed the chance of becoming a mason, was that it really did act up to what we, as a government and as a people, are pledged to — of treating each man on his merits as a man. When Brother George Washington went into a lodge of the fraternity, he went into the one place in the United States where he stood below or above his fellows according to their official position in the lodge. He went into the place where the idea of our government was realized as far as it is humanly possible for mankind to realize a lofty idea."

However, Roosevelt also ran into occasional snags with the society. In his letters, he chastised one alleged Mason for attempting to use his position in the society for political advantage (which is against the rules of Freemasonry), and complained about another situation in a letter to a friend, writing that one foe was "... endeavoring to use Masonry to my political disadvantage."

After his presidency, Roosevelt wrote about traveling the world and visiting Masonic lodges in Nairobi and the Azores.

Roosevelt wasn't just a Mason, however. He also belonged to the comparatively obscure and ridiculously named International Concatenated Order of Hoo-Hoo. What the heck is that? Well, as Forest History Society blogger Amanda T. Ross writes, "The Hoo-Hoos resemble less an exclusive secret society and more a business fraternity." It was a fraternal organization for men in the lumber industry, and boasted TR as one of its most famous members, due to his conservation work.