Answer: Our Lady of Endor Coven, also known as Ophite Cultus Satanas (originally spelled "Sathanas"), was a Satanic cult founded in 1948 by Herbert Arthur Sloane in Toledo, Ohio. The group was heavily influenced by gnosticism (especially that found in the contemporary book by Hans Jonas, The Gnostic Religion), and worshipped Satanas, their name for Satan (Cultus Satanas is a Latin version of Cult of Satan). Satanas (or Satan), was defined in gnostic terms, as the Serpent in the Garden of Eden who revealed the knowledge of the true God to Eve. That it called itself "Ophite" is a reference to the ancient gnostic sect of the Ophites, who were said to worship the serpent. The "Lady of Endor" is a reference to the Witch of Endor.
Sloane believed in a horned god, which he said was revealed to him in the woods when he was a child. After seeing Margaret Murray's book The God of the Witches, he said he realized that it was Satan (Sathanas) that was revealed to him. Sloane also corresponded with his contemporary Gerald Gardner, and implied that his views of Satan and the horned god were not necessarily in conflict with Gardner's approach. Sloane highly recommended the book The Gnostic Religion, and sections of it were sometimes read at ceremonies.
Explanation: It seems probable the group was in existence before 1966, although I have not found any traces of it in literature prior to that date. Sloane himself suggested that he was already operating in the 1940s, but given the many parallels with Wicca the group displayed, it is more likely its date of origin must be located sometime after 1953, the year Gerald Gardner's neopagan cult of witchcraft came into the open
