An analysis of membership (Master Masons) in the USA through the 20th century and early 21st century, the latter comparitively on a state-by-state basis in both chronological and demographic terms--what states "beat the model" of "blind demographics" and what states do even worse than blind demographics would dictate, how does this relate to state-by-state declines in membership over the early 21st century?
Before I petitioned I read the per capita membership data for New Hampshire going back to before the Revolution. I saw a century long sine wave up and down. I saw my petition was near the bottom of the current cycle. I concluded that I would see many brothers who have never seen anything but decline, but that members who joined a bit after me might never see anything but increasing degrees, then eventually increasing membership as the older brothers died off.
Once I arrived in Illinois and stated there for a decade, in addition to going through the line again I went to Lodge of Research library and gathered the membership data to confirm that per capita trend happened in Illinois as well. The trend did not appear in Illinois data. What the Illinois data showed is that wars spurred interest in our order and that petitions dropped as peacetime continued. Different region, different membership pattern. By the time I figured out how to deal with that data set, it was time to move to Texas.
I'm currently learning arcs. In the story lines of the degrees, in the 3/5/7 lessons, in the symbolic representation of time in the perambulations, again and again there are trajectories to be discerned.
