Contact

Reaching the editorial process at Secret Society Authority is straightforward. This page explains the geographic scope of the site's coverage, what details to include when sending a message, realistic expectations for response timing, and the secondary options available when a standard inquiry doesn't quite fit.

Service area covered

Secret Society Authority focuses on fraternal organizations, esoteric orders, and secret societies with a documented presence in the United States. That covers national organizations headquartered domestically — Freemasonry's Grand Lodges, the Knights of Columbus, the Odd Fellows, Skull and Bones at Yale, and comparable bodies — as well as internationally founded orders that maintain active American chapters.

The editorial scope also extends to historical coverage: colonial-era mutual aid societies, Civil War fraternal networks, and the broader evolution of fraternal orders through the 19th and 20th centuries. Inquiries about organizations primarily operating outside the US are outside the core coverage area, though the site does address cross-border influence where it's historically significant and well-documented.

Questions about types of secret societies, membership requirements, rituals and ceremonies, degrees and ranks, and secret society governance all fall squarely within the site's brief. So do corrections, sourcing questions, and additions to the glossary or resources and further reading sections.

What to include in your message

A message that includes 4 specific elements moves through the queue faster than one that doesn't:

1. The specific page or topic. Include the page title or URL where possible. "I have a question about Freemasonry" covers a lot of ground; "I have a question about the degrees system on the Freemasonry overview page" is immediately actionable.
2. The nature of the inquiry. Editorial corrections, sourcing requests, factual additions, and general research questions each go to different people. Naming which one applies saves a routing step.
3. Your source, if relevant. If the message is flagging an inaccuracy, include the primary source that contradicts the published information — a named publication, a lodge document, a digitized archive. Anonymous tips without documentation are harder to act on than sourced corrections.
4. A valid reply address. The response has nowhere to go without one. This sounds obvious, but it's the most common reason a thread goes cold.

There's no required word count or formal template. A three-sentence message that includes those four elements will be processed exactly as efficiently as a detailed one.

Response expectations

The editorial inbox is reviewed on a rolling basis, with a target first-response window of 3 to 5 business days for standard inquiries. Research questions involving archival sourcing or requests that touch political secret societies, religious and mystical orders, or conspiracy theories — areas where documentation is genuinely contested — may take longer, because the standard for any published change is verification against named public sources.

Correction requests that include a primary source citation are prioritized. If the source checks out, the relevant page is updated and the submitter is notified. If the source is disputed or partial, the editorial process may follow up with questions before making any change.

Two categories of message receive no response:

• Requests to promote or advertise specific lodges, chapters, or commercial membership services. The site is a reference resource, not a directory for recruitment.
• Requests to remove factually accurate, sourced information. Published content that cites named public sources and accurately represents documented history is not subject to removal on request.

The distinction is worth drawing clearly. Corrections of genuine errors are actively welcomed. Requests to suppress accurate information are not the same category of thing.

Additional contact options

For readers with questions that don't fit a standard editorial inquiry, three secondary paths are available.

The frequently asked questions page addresses the most common research questions about membership, secrecy, symbolism, and organizational structure — the kind of questions that arrive in volume and already have a documented answer.

The how to get help page handles a narrower category of inquiry: situations where someone is navigating a personal decision about joining, leaving, or understanding an organization they're already involved with. It points toward documented resources rather than offering individual guidance.

For questions about oaths and pledges, secrecy and confidentiality practices, or red flags and warning signs — topics where the concern is practical rather than purely historical — those pages are built to answer substantive questions without requiring a direct message at all.

The contact form itself is the right channel for everything that doesn't fit a published page: sourcing questions, corrections, archival leads, and factual additions. It's a narrow lane, but it's the most useful one.