The Order of the Occult Hand is a whimsical secret society

Secret society

A secret society is a club or organization whose activities and inner functioning are concealed from non-members. The society may or may not attempt to conceal its existence. The term usually excludes covert groups, such as intelligence agencies or guerrilla insurgencies, which hide their...

 of American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 journalists who have been able to slip the meaningless and telltale phrase "It was as if an occult hand had…" in print as a sort of a game and inside joke.

History

The magic phrase was introduced by Joseph Flanders, then a police reporter of The Charlotte News

The Charlotte News

The Charlotte News was the afternoon newspaper in Charlotte, North Carolina. The newspaper was eventually purchased by its larger rival, The Charlotte Observer but continued to be published until 1985.- See also :* The Charlotte Observer...

, in the fall of 1965, when he reported a millworker who was shot by his own family when he came back home late at night. He wrote:
Amused by this purple passage

Purple prose

Purple prose is a term of literary criticism used to describe passages, or sometimes entire literary works, written in prose so extravagant, ornate, or flowery as to break the flow and draw attention to itself. Purple prose is sensually evocative beyond the requirements of its context...

, in a local bar, his colleagues decided to commemorate Flanders' achievement by forming the Order of the Occult Hand. They even showed Flanders a banner made of a bed sheet depicting a bloody hand reaching out of a purple cloud. Among the original members were R.C. Smith, an associate editor, Stewart Spencer, then an editorial writer, John Gin, the city editor, and several others, who vowed to get the words into print as soon as possible. The editors were not happy about this mischief at all and ordered copy editors to be extremely vigilant, yet the phrase kept slipping into the paper and even into Down Beat

Down Beat

Down Beat is an American magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond" to indicate its expansion beyond the jazz realm which it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1934 in Chicago, Illinois...

, a jazz magazine, by Smith. The News revealed this tradition of high spirits, how it started, in 1985, when it went out of circulation.

Alternatively, Paul Greenberg

Paul Greenberg (journalist)

Paul Greenberg is an American syndicated columnist and author. He curretnly serves as the editorial page editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. His articles appear in various newspapers through Tribune Media Services syndicate. He has won the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing in 1969.-...

, the Pulitzer prize-winning editorial page editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette is the newspaper of record in the U.S. state of Arkansas, printed in Little Rock with a northwest edition published in Lowell...

, considers that Reese Cleghorn, then an editorial writer of The Charlotte Observer

The Charlotte Observer

The Charlotte Observer, serving Charlotte, North Carolina and its metro area, is the largest newspaper, in terms of circulation, in North Carolina and South Carolina...

, was the one who originated the Order. Cleghorn denied this claim. The Boston Globe

The Boston Globe

The Boston Globe is an American daily newspaper based in Boston, Massachusetts. The Boston Globe has been owned by The New York Times Company since 1993...

once reported that the Occult Hand Club was a replacement for the Defective Busbar

Busbar

In electrical power distribution, a bus bar is a strip of copper or aluminium that conducts electricity within a switchboard, distribution board, substation or other electrical apparatus....

 Club, which was open to any journalist who used the words, such as, "the cause of the fire was attributed to a defective busbar

Busbar

In electrical power distribution, a bus bar is a strip of copper or aluminium that conducts electricity within a switchboard, distribution board, substation or other electrical apparatus....

, officials said."

The occult-hand phrase did not stop in the Charlotte News and Observer, but has crept onto other media. The use of the phrase has spread to newspaper media around the world, like an occult hand with fingers in many forms of media, or "a cough in a classroom" and "a pox". The Order was occasionally endangered by reckless and artless users of the phrase, but it retained overall secrecy until 2004, when James Janega of the Chicago Tribune

Chicago Tribune

The Chicago Tribune is a major daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and the flagship publication of the Tribune Company. Formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" , it remains the most read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region and is...

published a thorough investigation about the Order. Upon exposure to the public, Greenberg made a full confession.

In 2006, Greenberg announced that the Order had chosen a new secret phrase at an annual editorial writers' convention and resumed a stealth operation,

Members

The New York Times

The New York Times

The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

in 1974 by Paul Hofmann

Paul Hofmann

Paul Hofmann was an author, journalist, linguist, and political activist. The New York Times, for whom he was a foreign correspondent, described him as, fluent in German, Italian, French, and English, having a command of several other languages that was more than passable, as well as "a broad...

 and in 1998 by Tim Race

• "Wonders if Cyprus events might have been 'organized by some occult hand' as part of W Eur global strategy."

  "Even worse, with some E-mail systems, if the writer doesn't fill in the subject line, the occult hand of artificial intelligence will enter No Subject."

The Los Angeles Times from 1983 to 1999 by Deborah Caulfield, Jay Sharbutt, Dennis McDougal

Dennis McDougal

Dennis McDougal is an author and journalist. He has worked for a variety of publications and has earned over 50 honors, including the National Headliners Award and several Associated Press awards, and has been called "L.A.'s No...

, Charles Champlin, Nancy Wride, and Stephen Braun

• "It was as if an occult hand had passed over Nick Mancuso's face, momentarily transforming him into Tennessee Williams."

  "...one might say it was as if an occult hand had hurled a raspberry at Hollywood."

  "He said it is as if an occult hand had arbitrarily determined which..."

  "...Saturday, it was as if an occult hand had passed over the Academy Awards..."

  "Then it was as if an occult hand had made a mystical sign..."

  "...I found myself seemingly driven by an occult hand into the arms of the Saturn..."

  "It was as if an occult hand had substituted an alternate universe for..."

The Boston Globe

The Boston Globe

The Boston Globe is an American daily newspaper based in Boston, Massachusetts. The Boston Globe has been owned by The New York Times Company since 1993...

from 1987 to 2000 by John Powers, M. R. Montgomery, Paul Hirshson, David Mehegan

• "Bears president Mike McCaskey swore that it was as if an occult hand (belonging to the shade of Bears founder George Halas) had reached out and tipped the ball."

  "In Newsweek, it is as if Sabrina were saved by an occult hand, as she 'turned up safe and sound.'"

  "It's dark and scary, and has all kinds of spooky stuff in it, including a moving occult hand that actually -- well, we don't want to spoil the surprise."

  "Inside, the lights go down and a sultry voice describes the audio systems, while some occult hand activates each component in turn."

  "Nails, screws, small tools and thingamajigs accumulate and then relocate as if moved by an occult hand to some new hiding spot."

  "If a president of Harvard ever intervenes in something like a promotion or a course outline, it is well disguised, the work of an occult hand."

  "Just as the Gardner was negotiating with Humphries, the British weaving firm, a complete bit of that pattern, with the repeats, was revealed almost as if by an occult hand in Hokam Hall, home of Lord Leicester, in Wells-next-the-Sea, England."

  "We like to think we have earned success, after all, and discount the occult hand of fate."

The Associated Press from 1991 to 2006 by Jay Sharbutt, Scott Williams, Eric Fidler, John Skoyles, and Joann Loviglio

• "As the show wears on, your eyelids may slam shut, as if tugged by an occult hand.

  "Veil became the pawn of a conspiracy so vast it's as if an occult hand had plucked him out of our reality and dropped him into a private nightmare."

  "When he plays the blues, it is as if some occult hand is guiding his hand over the guitar, channeling the essence of the blues through Clapton."

  "It is as if an occult hand placed Calvino in our country so we could appreciate our own eccentricities."

  "After venturing through museum catacombs and rooms that held everything from whale eyeballs to flesh-eating beetles feasting on animal carcasses, it was as if an occult hand led them to the hall of Cretaceous dinosaurs.

The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette from 1993 to 2004 by Paul Greenberg

Paul Greenberg (journalist)

Paul Greenberg is an American syndicated columnist and author. He curretnly serves as the editorial page editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. His articles appear in various newspapers through Tribune Media Services syndicate. He has won the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing in 1969.-...

 and Kane Webb

• "It was as if an occult hand was at work, or maybe a screenwriter for one of Mel Brooks' slapstick comedies."

  "It's as if an occult hand had reached into newspaper offices across the country and assembled a whole menagerie of opinionators, from the ring-tailed roarers to the loyal meeks."

  "Then there's the care Hillary Clinton, Esq. took with those disappearing billing records, which had the strangest way of appearing years later in the White House--as if an occult hand were moving them about."

  "As if by an occult hand, the following correspondence was delivered to the White House mail room yesterday:"

  "And now, as if by an occult hand, Harry himself has been freed."

  "The Dan Ryan and Eisenhower Expressways would be overrun with stalled vehicles, as if an occult hand had just emptied the Loop.

  "As if by an occult hand, they appear-mama, papa, and baby."

The Washington Times

The Washington Times

The Washington Times is a daily broadsheet newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. It was founded in 1982 by Unification Church founder Sun Myung Moon, and until 2010 was owned by News World Communications, an international media conglomerate associated with the...

from 1996 to 1998 by Rex Bowman, Sean Scully, Ronald J. Hansen, and Jim Keary

• "And on Tuesday, as if an occult hand were meting out justice to the senator, Mark Warner seemed poised to make the same comeback."

  "It was as if an occult hand had reached down to throw beleaguered Democrat Donald S. Beyer Jr. a wee crumb on an otherwise bleak night."

  "It was as if an occult hand had delivered a cold slap of reality to the efforts of D.C. Chief Management Officer Camille Cates Barnett, who hopes to make the parking system work again."

  "But even with that explanation, it was as if an occult hand swept him away - into handcuffs and into the back seat of a police cruiser."

The Virginian-Pilot

The Virginian-Pilot

The Virginian-Pilot is a daily newspaper based in Norfolk, Virginia, and serving the Hampton Roads metropolitan area, southeastern Virginia, the Eastern Shore of Virginia, and northeastern North Carolina. The flagship property of Landmark Media Enterprises, The Pilot is Virginia's largest daily...

in 1997 by Larry Maddry

• {cite news|title=Amazing new fabric fits notoriously messy eater|author=Larry Maddry|date=19 March 1997}}

  "The fact is a food item which seems inert in a glass container - cocktail sauce for shrimp is a good example - has been known to sail as far as 15 feet to where I stand and hit the sleeve of my coat as though tossed by an occult hand."

The Washington Post

The Washington Post

The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...

in 1997 by Linton Weeks

• "It was as if an occult hand had guided the black sphere down the narrow lane and into the triangle of pins."

The Post-Standard in 2000 by an anonymous author

• "As if moved by an occult hand, phantom emus keep popping up in Oswego County."

Star-Tribune in 2001 and 2002 by Eric Hanson and Kristin Tillotson

• "It was as if an occult hand had taken Chuck Klosterman's radio, tuned away from the Top 40 ear candy of Duran Duran and the Stray Cats, and tuned into the satanic debauchery of Motley Crue."

  "It was as if an occult hand had reached down and given the nation's television critics a pinch on the tush."

The Bangkok Post from 2002 to 2007 by Wanda Sloan

• "Mr Charoen said he never interfered in such a minor business venture, but it was as if an occult hand had touched the plaza and every vendor suddenly promised to sell only legal software, movies and music."

  "A curious and concerned reader named Joe clicked on "Tools" and then "Windows Update" and found himself transported as if by an occult hand to WindowsUpdate.Microsoft.com -- where he was confronted by a staggering 22 update packages for Windows XP and a staggering lack of instructions on what to do about it."

  "Greenpeace campaigner Patwajee Sri-suwan denied removing anything from the centre; by incredible coincidence, as if by an occult hand, Greenpeace found a papaya tree 60km from the research site, no idea how it got there."

  "Finally, as if by an occult hand, there it was out on the table, your TOT Corp coming clean;"

  "it was almost as if some occult hand had guided the convenient contract issuance."

Others

• "It's as if an occult hand had reached out and intentionally destroyed your data."

  "One morning last week, while pondering the daily question of khakis vs. jeans, it was as if an occult hand reached down and plucked the baggy green pants from the hanger and thrust them at me."

  "It was as if an occult hand had pointed you out to each other."

  "As if an occult hand had slipped over his shoulder to assist, the little plastic shelf slides back into the machine and begins to whirr."