Freemasonry and Native American Traditions

"Here’s a new slant on how American Indians may have actually had what was the forerunner of Freemasonry as we have it today. To accept this theory it is necessary to set aside the discovery of America by Columbus, and possibly even the claim that Leif Ericson came here looking for Minnesota ahead of all the others. Now comes the story that ancient Welsh bards have records of a Prince Madoc who was presumed to have been lost at sea in 1172. Five hundred years later a report came from America of two or three Indian tribes which spoke the Welsh tongue. About 1909 two Welsh miners, looking for gold in Arizona, came across an Indian tribe rehearsing a Masonic ceremony in Welsh. The supposition is that Prince Madoc reached the Americas and taught the Welsh tongue and Welsh Freemasonry to the natives."

The California Freemason magazine reproduced the above passage from the Oregon Freemason in 1956.