At 8:13 p.m. on Friday, January 13, 1882 (130 years ago today), in room 13 of his Knickerbocker Cottage, Captain Fowler and twelve men he recruited over the previous year (it took that long to find candidates brave enough), assembled for a highly symbolic dinner. To reach their meal guests passed beneath a ladder and under a banner that read “Morituri te Salutamus,” or “Those of us who are about to die salute you.” Thirteen candles lit the first of 13 courses: big platters of lobster salad molded into coffin shape. Salt cellars lay toppled about the table, but tossing a pinch of spilled salt over the shoulder was strictly forbidden. Thus was born the Thirteen Club.
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The Thirteen Club would count among its honorary members no fewer than four former presidents of the United States (Chester A. Arthur, Grover Cleveland, Benjamin Harrison, and Theodore Roosevelt), whose endorsements brought in men from every hall of power. Similar groups like the “Morgue Club” (alas, we have no box of their reports for comparison) and the “Vampires” sprang up around the country, but eventually enthusiasm waned, and while the Thirteen Club pops up in newspaper stories as late as the 1920s, it quietly faded out of existence. So, come on, get out of bed and raise a glass of hemlock in memory of Captain Fowler. Just take care not to splash any on that approaching black cat….
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