Why are Fridays that fall on the month's 13th day so fearsome? One of the most popular theories, links Friday the 13th with the fall of a fearsome group of legendary warriors--the Knights Templar. Founded around 1118 as a monastic military order devoted to the protection of pilgrims traveling to the Holy Land-following the Christian capture of Jerusalem during the First Crusade, the Knights Templar quickly became one of the richest and most influential groups of the Middle Ages, thanks to lavish donations from the crowned heads of Europe, eager to curry favor with the fierce Knights. By the turn of the 14th century, the Templars had established a system of castles, churches and banks throughout Western Europe. And it was this astonishing wealth that would lead to their downfall.  For the Templars, that end began in the early morning hours of Friday, October 13 1307, when officers of King Phillip IV of France arrested hundreds of the Knights Templar. In the days and weeks that followed that frightful Friday, more than 600 Templars were arrested. The men were charged with a wide array of offenses including heresy, devil worship, homosexuality, fraud and financial corruption.  In the spring of 1314, Grand Master Moleyu and several other Templars were burned at the stake in Paris, bringing an end to their remarkable era, and launching an even longer-lasting theory about the evil possibilities of Friday the 13th.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  Fear of the number 13 has even earned a psychological term: TRISKAIDEKAPHOBIA.  In the late 19th century, a New Yorker named Captain William Fowler (1827 - 1897) sought to remove the enduring stigma surrounding the number 13--and particularly the unwritten rule about not having 13 guests at a dinner table--by founding an exclusive society called the Thirteen Club. The group dined regularly on the 13th day of the month in room 13 of the Knickerbocker Cottage, a popular watering hole Fowler owned from 1863 to 1883.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       An important milestone in the history of the Friday the 13th legend in particular (not just the number 13) occurred in 1907, with the publication of the novel Friday, the Thirteenth written by Thomas William Lawson. The book told the story of a New York City stockbroker who plays on superstitions about the date to create chaos on Wall Street, and make a killing on the market.