Today is Friday the 13th and as I’m sure some of you already know it supposedly orginates from the Knights of the Templar. The story goes that the Knights Templar, the legendary order of “warrior monks” formed during the Christian Crusades to fight Islam, by the 1300s the order had grown so mighty and powerful that the King and Pope saw them as a threat. So they came up with a plan to bring them down. 

On October 13, 1307, officers of King Philip IV of France arrested several thousand Templars. They were charged with all sorts of bad stuff - heresy, blasphemy, homosexual practices amongst other various obscenities. None of these would ever be proven and they had been found innocent in other places but in the years that followed the Templars were subjected to excruciating tortue and over a hundred died from either this or being burnt at the stake.

Did You Know? 90% of US skyscrapers do away with floor number 13, according to reports by the Otis Elevator Company, the world’s largest elevator manufacturers.

Did You Know? In 1881, a group of 13 people came together to form The Thirteen Club. Their main objective was to dissipate some of the ominous associations of number 13. The number of members eventually rose to 400 which included 5 US presidents namely, Benjamin Harrison, Grover Cleveland, William McKinley, Theodore Roosevelt and Chester Arthur. Theodore Roosevelt placed the cornerstone for a new county courthouse in New York on Friday, 13th July in the year 1900.

Did You Know? The 32nd President of the United States, Franklin Roosevelt, never travelled on a 13th and refused to have a meal with 13 people at the table.

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Despite that things have been going quite well for us in the office this week, with our director away camping this week things have been running surprisingly smoothly (touch wood) so let’s hope Friday the 13th doesn’t ruin it for us!