The Good Shepherd

[David Guyatt]

What particularly struck me about the film was it's very strong WASP/Anglo elitism operating in the shadows as the secret government. America may have many Italians, Jews and untold numbers of other nationalities as citizens, but the Damon character makes clear in one scene they re present there only under sufferance and will never be part of the guiding hand of the state.

At Frank Wisner's funeral there was left a floral tribute in the shape of a "7" from the University of Virginia. It was noted by one historian and author who wrote a book about Wisner that the tribute signified that Wisner had been tapped as one of the nations leaders. This tribute was from the "Society of Seven". When I tried to research this there was nothing on the internet about it. Today, the SoS has it's own Wiki page:

even Society
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about a secret society at the University of Virginia. For the College of William & Mary secret society, see Seven Society (Order of the Crown and Dagger).


The sign of the Seven Society on a plaque outside Old Cabell Hall
The Seven Society (founded 1905)[1] is the most secretive of the University of Virginia's secret societies. Members are only revealed after their death, when a wreath of black magnolias in the shape of a "7" is placed at the gravesite, the bell tower of the University Chapel chimes seven times at seven-second intervals on the seventh dissonant chord when it is seven past the hour, and a notice is published in the University's Alumni News, and often in the Cavalier Daily. [2] The most visible tradition of the society is the painting of the logo of the society, the number 7 surrounded by the signs for alpha (A), omega (Ω), and infinity (∞), and sometimes several stars, upon many buildings around the grounds of the University.[3]
There is no clear history of the founding of the society. There is a legend that, of eight men who planned to meet for a card game, only seven showed up,[4] and they formed the society. Other histories claim that the misbehavior of other secret societies, specifically the Hot Feet (later the IMP Society), led University President Edwin A. Alderman to call both the Hot Feet and the Z Society into his office and suggest that a more "beneficial organization" was needed.[1]
The only known method to successfully contact the Seven Society is to place a letter at the Thomas Jefferson statue inside the University's historic Rotunda (accounts differ on the exact placement of the letter, either on the base or in the crook of the statue's arm).[5]
Contents [hide]
1 Philanthropic gifts
2 Notable members
3 Seven Society at other colleges/universities
4 References
5 See also
[edit]Philanthropic gifts

The group contributes financially to the University, announcing donations with letters signed only with seven astronomical symbols in the order: Earth, Jupiter, Mercury, Mars, Neptune, Uranus, and Venus. Saturn is not included. The Society gives large monetary donations and scholarships to the University each year in quantities that include the number 7, e.g. $777 or $1,777. Significant past gifts to the University include the Seven Society Carillon in the UVA Chapel, donated in memory of deceased members of the society, and given with the request that there should be a toll of seven times seven bells on the passing of a member;[6] a memorial to past Seven Society members who gave their lives in World War I[7]; $17,777.77 for a loan fund in honor of University president John Lloyd Newcomb; the ceremonial mace carried in academic processions;[2] $10,777.77 in support of the re-establishment of Homecoming;[8] a plaque on the Rotunda honoring University students who died in the Korean War;[9] $7,077.77 to endow the Ernest Mead Fund for the Music Library;[10] $47,777.77 for the making of a film on the honor system;[11] and $1 million in support of the University's South Lawn Project.[12] Most recently, the society gave a $777,777.77 grant to fund the Mead Endowment, which awards grants to professors to teach their "dream classes."[13]
In addition to granting spontaneous gifts, the Seven Society sponsors an annual $7,000 graduate fellowship award for superb teaching.[14]


The Seven Society sign in front of Maury Hall
[edit]Notable members

The Seven Society is unusual among University of Virginia secret societies in including members who were not students or alumni of the University. Notable examples include Mary Proffitt, secretary to Dean James M. Page and Dean Ivey F. Lewis;[15][16] and Ivey F. Lewis himself, a non-alumnus professor and longtime dean of students at the University.[17]
Several notable individuals whose Seven Society membership was disclosed at their death include:
James Rogers McConnell, student and volunteer for the Lafayette Escadrille during World War I, memorialized in Gutzon Borglum's statue The Aviator[18]
Frank Wisner - head of Office of Strategic Services operations in southeastern Europe at the end of World War II, and the head of the Directorate of Plans of the Central Intelligence Agency during the 1950s.[19]
John Lloyd Newcomb, second president of the University of Virginia
Edward Stettinius, Jr., secretary of state under Presidents Roosevelt and Truman[20]
Adm. William F. Halsey [20]
Frank Hereford, fifth president of the University of Virginia
H. Lockwood Frizzell, drafted by the Philadelphia Eagles[21]
[edit]Seven Society at other colleges/universities

There have been several secret societies with "seven" in their name. No connection between the societies has been shown, but there is at least some tradition in the use of the names.
One such secret society is the Seven Society (Order of the Crown and Dagger) known to exist at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. The founding date of the William and Mary society is reported to have been as early as 1826.[22]
A second unrelated society was the Mystic Seven Fraternity, constituted in 1885,[23] of which the Virginia Temple of the Hands and Torch was the parent chapter. Prior to the Civil War, there had been a Mystical Seven Society, with several chapters across the South. One surviving group at Mississippi created a chapter at Virginia. That Virginia chapter later organized the Mystic Seven Fraternity, also calling the new organization Phi Theta Alpha. [24] Five years later the Mystic Seven Fraternity merged with Beta Theta Pi, with the Virginia chapter becoming the Omicron chapter of Beta Theta Pi. [25]
A third unrelated society, also called Mystical Seven, was founded in 1907 at the University of Missouri. It is often claimed that this society was directly inspired by the Seven Society at Virginia, (although no citations are given), but it took the older Mystical Seven name.

There is a lot to digest in this Wiki entry. For example, on the origin of the name Seven and the eight men who arranged to play cards of who only 7 turned up, my guess is that the cards in question were Tarot cards.

The symbolism of the SoS '7" as follows is clearly occult in nature:


The sign of the Seven Society on a plaque outside Old Cabell Hall

And


The Seven Society sign in front of Maury Hall

7 is a number of great significance for the Knights Templar.

I have spent quite a lot of time looking at the numbers "7" and a higher expression "777" in all sorts of contexts in the past. One notable area is this"



Also rendered this way:



Both are flags of the South African Neo-nazi Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB)

Which, if one follows it back in history takes one to Druidism with which SS-1 Heinrich Himmler and his occult buddies of the SS Ahnenerbe were mightily interested in.

**

My apologies for hijacking yet another thread Jan. It can't help myself. It's a case of "word association football", I think - one set of thoughts unlocks others and I'm off down the slippery slope I'm afraid.