As I pack for the Pi Beta Phi Convention in Chicago, I can’t help but think back on a convention which took place 100 years ago. In 1915, Berkeley, California was the site of Pi Phi’s first west coast convention. (A good many other Greek-letter organizations also met there that year. It was a popular spot because of the Pan-American Exposition. I’ll get to a post about that someday.)
One of my favorite Pi Phis, Grace Goodhue Coolidge, attended that 1915 convention. At the 1901 Syracuse Convention, she served as the University of Vermont chapter’s delegate. After her marriage to a Northampton, Massachusetts, lawyer, Vermont native Calvin Coolidge, a Phi Gamma Delta, she helped found of the Western Massachusetts Alumnae Club of Pi Beta Phi. She was elected Province Vice-President and it was in that capacity that she attended the 1915 Convention.
The Round Robin letter began after the convention and Grace and more than a dozen of her Pi Phi friends sent a Round Robin letter from 1915 until their deaths. During the White House years, one of the Robin letters was confiscated by the security detail until the First Lady explained the reasoning behind the seemingly group of random letters.
