Marie Russak

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Marie Russak (also well-known as Marie Hotchener or Marie Barnard) was born in October 7, 1865 in the small city of Four Corners, Butte County in northern California.

She studied music at Mills College in Oakland. She became a renowned singer, performin in several European cities. In 1899, she married the opera producer Frank Russak. She was deeply interested in Theosophy and became active in the Theosophical Society.

Between 1906 and 1910 she lived in Adyar, India, where she deepened her study of esoterism. She participated actively in Co-Masonry; and in 1912, she co-founded the Order of the Temple of the Rosy Cross with Annie Besant. She worked actively with the Rosicrucians, until the group was dissolved in 1918.

Russak continued to work in the Theosophical Society and was contacted in California by Harvey Spencer Lewis, who in 1915, had founded the Order Rosicrucian AMORC. She transmitted many of the esoteric knowledge that she had acquired and she collaborated with the elaboration of some rituals, which were similar to those made of the OTRC.

Marie Russak was also involved in archictural design and her work can still be seen Krotona, California where some of her designs were inspired by Moorish and Mission styles. One of her buidings, Moorcrest, probably completed in 1921, was rented by Charlie Chaplin, before its sale in 1925, to the parents of Mary Astor, Mr. and Mrs. Otto Langhanke.

Marie Russak died March 4, 1945, in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California.