Did the Freemasons consciously affect the geographical growth of the USA in order to invest the layout of the states with a deeper, symbolic meaning? The narrative concentrates on the development of Masonic ritual during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries—especially their description of the 'ideal building' or Temple—the concurrent construction of America and the role Freemasons played in it, and the emergence of a simple but highly symbolic mathematical formula that recurs regularly throughout the history of the Republic.