Notable figures

Notable figures

• Theodor Reuss 1855–1923
  Co-founder; Outer Head until 1922

  German occultist, journalist, and Masonic high-degree organiser who, with Carl Kellner, established the order in its early form. Reuss admitted Aleister Crowley to the order in 1910 and authorised him to lead its English-speaking work.

• Aleister Crowley 1875–1947
  Outer Head 1922–1947; principal architect of the modern order

  English occultist, writer, and mountaineer who restructured the O.T.O. as a vehicle for Thelema following his reception of The Book of the Law in Cairo in 1904. The bulk of the order’s present ritual, doctrinal, and ecclesiastical material derives from his pen.

• Karl Germer 1885–1962
  Outer Head 1947–1962

  German-American businessman and longtime financial supporter of Crowley who succeeded him as head of the order. The succession following Germer’s death in 1962 is the source of the principal twentieth-century lineage disputes within the order.