Fraternity History & More

On National Teacher Appreciation Day: SIUC and the AES / NPC Merger

Posted on May 7, 2013 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

May 7 is National Teacher Appreciation Day. In honor of Southern Illinois University’s beginnings as a teaching training institution (also known as a normal school), I am including this segment of the history of SIUC’s fraternity system.

There were three mergers which affected the women’s fraternities at SIU. The first and most important was the 1947 merger of the Association of Education Sororities and the National Panhellenic Conference. The most painful merger affecting SIU was that of the national organizations of Delta Sigma Epsilon and Delta Zeta (this really is a fascinating read – the alumnae were finally released from the terms of the merger). The easiest merger for the SIU campus was the one between Pi Kappa Sigma and Sigma Kappa’s national organizations.

Merger of National Coordinating Organizations

The Association of Education Sororities [AES] was founded in 1915 as the Association of Pedagogical Sororities. In 1946, six national organizations, Sigma Sigma Sigma, Delta Sigma Epsilon, Pi Kappa Sigma, Alpha Sigma Alpha, Alpha Sigma Tau, and Theta Sigma Upsilon, comprised the Association of Education Sororities. Its members had chapters at teacher training institutions (Stintson, 1956). The National Panhellenic Conference [NPC] began in 1902 as an umbrella organization of seven women’s fraternities. These groups sanctioned only chapters at senior colleges and universities (Leonard, 1958).

Mrs. Edward A. Beidler, Delta Sigma Epsilon’s National Secretary, wrote President Lay regarding the merger: “Certain details are to be worked out before full participation is granted in National Panhellenic Conference activities. One of the stipulations for National Panhellenic Conference membership is that: It (Delta Sigma Epsilon) must have all of its chapters established in senior colleges and universities which are authorized to confer a Bachelor’s Degree, and which are given satisfactory rating by the Association of American Universities and/or the pertinent recognized Regional Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. We are pleased with this new affiliation and feel it will bring added prestige to our sorority and to the colleges where we have chapters. (Mrs. E. A. Beidler, personal communication, November 22, 1947)

The merger of AES and NPC was a significant one in the history of women’s fraternities. Teacher training institutions were evolving into more comprehensive institutions. SIU was a prime example of this trend. The AES and NPC merger was meant to strengthen the entire women’s fraternity system by dissolving unnecessary lines of demarcation. Had this merger not taken place, many institutions would have encountered problems in regards to women’s fraternities. Helen Shuman, Dean of Women at SIU, echoed these thoughts in her congratulatory statement on the merger, “I was pleased to learn that the sororities belonging to the Association of Education Sororities have been accepted as members of National Panhellenic Conference. It will solve some of the problems potential on our campus” (Stintson, 1956, p. 299).

Shuman’s private comments to President Lay showed a larger concern and a sense of relief that the merger put to rest some of the dilemmas SIU could have faced had the merger not taken place: “As the teachers colleges over the country have received a greater degree of accreditation, some unpleasant situations have arisen on some campuses. I had ‘prayed’ that these situations would not come into the picture at Southern, and I am pleased that the situation is no longer potentially full of problems.” (H. A. Shuman, personal communication, December 15, 1947)

The former AES organizations had two years before they would be faced with competition from the NPC groups. Marie S. Dunham, Sigma Sigma Sigma Executive Secretary, told President Lay of an NPC ruling which stated that not until January 1, 1949 would any NPC member make overtures leading to future chapters on campuses then occupied by AES organizations. Dunham felt that the merger would strengthen the women’s fraternity system and would, “result in wider opportunity for service in every way. You may be sure that Tri Sigma’s best efforts are pledged to that end” (M. S. Dunham, personal communication, December 12, 1947).

Shuman had received a letter from a Delta Zeta national officer regarding the number of women’s groups on campus. Shuman answered the Delta Zeta letter in November, 1948. She also kept President Morris apprised of the situation: “Since the college field is no longer to be divided into two territories open to the different kinds of sororities but open to all sororities, and since we are one of the ‘coming’ universities, I expect a number of the sororities belonging to the NPC to solicit the opportunity of establishing groups at Southern. Recently I have had a letter from a group other than the Delta Zetas.” (H. A. Shuman, personal communication, November 30, 1948)

Delta Zeta was the first of the older NPC groups to establish a chapter at SIU. Its Gamma Omega chapter was installed in 1953. The founding of the Delta Zeta chapter was followed by the Kappa Gamma chapter of Sigma Kappa in 1955. The Beta Eta chapter of Alpha Gamma Delta was chartered in 1957 after the former Delta Sigma Epsilon chapter was released from the terms of Delta Sigma Epsilon’s national merger with Delta Zeta.

In 1926, three years after it was founded, Epsilon Beta, a local organization at Southern Illinois Normal University, gave this bench to the University. It sits in front of Wheeler Hall. At the time it was given, Wheeler Hall served as the library.
Epsilon Beta became part of a national organization, Delta Sigma Epsilon,in 1928. Delta Sigma Epsilon was a member of the Association of Education Sororities. When the national organization merged with Delta Zeta in 1956, the SIUC chapter did not go along with the merger. Instead it became a local organization, Nu Delta Sigma, until a release from the merger was granted from the Delta Zeta national organization. The organization that started out as Epsilon Beta became the Beta Eta Chapter of Alpha Gamma Delta on September 21, 1957.

From A HISTORY OF THE FRATERNITY SYSTEM AT SOUTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY FROM 1948 THROUGH 1960 by Frances DeSimone Becque, Pages 63-65.

Posted in Alpha Gamma Delta, Association of Education Sororities, Delta Zeta, GLO, Greek-letter Organization, Greek-letter Organization History, Sigma Kappa, Sigma Sigma Sigma, Sorority History, Southern Illinois University Carbondale, Women's Fraternity History | Tagged AES, Alpha Gamma Delta, Association of Education Sororities, Delta Sigma Epsilon, National Panhellenic Conference, NPC, Southern Illinois University Carbondale | Comments Off

The First Fraternity House Built by Women for Women

Posted on May 5, 2013 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

Syracuse University has the distinction of being home to the first fraternity house owned by women. There were no dormitories for women when Alpha Phi and Gamma Phi Beta were founded in 1872 and 1874, respectively. In 1884, the Alpha Phi chapter gave up the meeting rooms it rented in a downtown bank. According to Alpha Phi Fraternity (1931), plans were made to rent a house “where the out-of-town girls could live and where one room could be used for a chapter hall. The experiment proved a success, and at the end of a year it was suggested that the girls build and own a chapter house.” (p. xxiii)

Jennie Thornburn [Sanford], an 1887 Alpha Phi initiate, recounted the story of Alpha Phi’s chapter house and she gave credit to Grace Latimer [Merrick], for “making practical by figures, by argument and by enthusiasm the possibility of building and owning a house. At first we thought it a crazy idea; it was certainly novel – no girls had ever owned a chapter house.” (Alpha Phi Fraternity, 1931, p. 142)

In May of 1886, a 56’ x 178’ lot at 17 University Place was purchased by the members of Alpha Phi for $1,400, or $25 a front foot (Thomson, 1943). A few of the members’ fathers acted as a Board of Trustees. A $2,500 bank mortgage was arranged and another father loaned the chapter $2,700. The father of a chapter member was himself a building contractor. He contributed his services and asked the firms with which he dealt to contribute some materials. An eyewitness described the start of the building process, “At 2 P.M. June 22, 1886, on the lot opposite the campus of Syracuse University, which had already been purchased by the Alpha Chapter of Alpha Phi, were held the exercises attending the laying of the corner stone of the first chapter house owned by the society. Ida Gilbert DeLamater Houghton, ‘76, one of the founders of the organization, struck the gavel upon the unfinished foundation wall. Carrie Shevelson Benjamin, ‘81, read a paper, at the conclusion of which a song composed by Lydia Thompson ‘83 was sung. After a short address by Chancellor Sims,[1] Dr. W. P. Coddington [2] laid the corner stone in the name of the Alpha Chapter of Alpha Phi. In closing all joined in a familiar college song and the interesting ceremonies were completed. This was the first chapter house built by women and the day was the fourteenth anniversary of the founding of the Alpha Phi society.”(“Alpha’s new home,” 1911, p. 22)

The chapter moved into its new home in November. The chapter hall was dedicated in January, 1887, and on Washington’s birthday, the chapter opened the house to 300 invited guests. In order to pay the mortgages, “it was decided to have the members make an annual subscription to a house fund, each girl giving what she thought she could afford. This was done, the largest amount given being fifty dollars” (“Alpha’s new home,” 1911, p. 23). In 1896, the chapter house was redecorated at a cost of $600. By 1902, the debts had been paid. It was time to move again. The house became too small for the chapter’s 40 members. At the same time, and the Bacon residence on Walnut Park became available. The Bacon family had Alpha Phi members in it. Thirty women could live in the new house.

The old chapter house was sold to the university for dormitory use. The Alpha Phis were allowed to remove the bannisters and muleposts. Gavels and bookends were made and given to collegiate chapters. The stained glass windows were preserved as well. The central window is in the current chapter house. The two side-light windows are at Alpha Phi’s headquarters in Evanston, Illinois.

The Alpha Phi chapter house on University Avenue [4] in Syracuse. It was the first house built and owned by a women’s fraternity. The house was sold in 1902 and the chapter moved to its current home on Walnut Place.

Galpin (1960) noted that in 1895, during Chancellor Day’s administration, there were six men’s and four women’s fraternities and “Nothing was said about students living in homes, either rented or owned by them; nor could there be much criticism so long as the University had no dormitories of its own” (p. 346). By the turn of the century all the women’s fraternities at Syracuse University were either renting, on their way to owning, or being the proud possessors of a home in which to house and feed members and to provide a meeting place for chapter activities.

[1] Chancellor Sims was also the father of an Alpha Phi member.

[2] Syracuse University professor Dr. Wellesley Perry Coddington was a popular man among the three women’s fraternities founded at Syracuse. Alpha Gamma Delta was founded in 1904 in Dr. Coddington’s home.

[3] The Bacon home had belonged to the family of an Alpha Phi member.

[4] A 5/5/2013 p.s. not in the dissertation. I have heard and I believe I have read that the Alpha Phi home was located on the land occupied by the Newhouse School of Public Communications complex. I can’t put my hands on that documentation right now. Plugging the address in google maps brings up a location closer to the Medical Center.

From “Coeducation and the History of Women’s Fraternities 1867-1902” by Frances DeSimone Becque, 2002.

Posted in Alpha Gamma Delta, Alpha Phi, Gamma Phi Beta, GLO, Greek-letter Organization, Greek-letter Organization History, National Panhellenic Conference, Sorority History, Syracuse University, Women's Fraternity History | Tagged Alpha Gamma Delta, Alpha Phi, first sorority house, first women's fraternity house, Syracuse University, Wellesley P. Coddington | Comments Off

Fraternity and Sorority Magazines – Preserving History, Fostering Enthusiasm and Promulgating Lifelong Loyalty

Posted on May 3, 2013 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

This week, I had the opportunity to read hard copies of recently published sorority magazines.* What fun it was to turn the pages and read about some of the 26 National Panhellenic Conference (NPC) organizations! Good works are being done. Current topics are being discussed. Lifelong membership is being promulgated.

The editors of the NPC organization’s magazines met for the first time prior to the first session of the 12^th National Pan-Hellenic Congress (as it was then called) meeting in October 1913 at the Congress Hotel in Chicago, Illinois. Eleven editors attended. In addition, some groups were represented by former editors, business managers and NPC delegates. A few organizations had two or three representatives. R. Louise Fitch, editor of The Trident, was elected chairman and L. Pearle Green, editor of Kappa Alpha Theta, was elected secretary (Green also served as NPC Chairman in 1909 and 1949). The editors discussed life subscriptions, business management, and general editorial issues. The opportunity to meet as a group “was so successful and the mutual problems found to be so universal, that it was agreed that the conference should meet at least biennially, in the future.”

I find it interesting to note that all 14 magazines represented in the picture above are still being published. The four additional organizations whose editors are not pictured (Sigma Kappa, Zeta Tau Alpha, Phi Mu, and Kappa Delta) were also members of NPC in 1913 when this collage was put together by Florence A. Armstrong, Editor of The Lyre. The 18 organizations comprising NPC in 1913 are all members of NPC today. Also included in the collage is one NPC woman extraordinaire, Ida Shaw Martin, who was identified as the Sorority Editor of the Greek Exchange (also known as Banta’s Greek Exchange). Martin was a founder of Delta Delta Delta, better know to generations of Tri Deltas as Sarah Ida Shaw.

Armstrong noted that during the Congress “a report on the use made of fraternity journals by the college libraries was read and discussed. The majority of college libraries welcome the publications of those fraternities represented in the college community and give them a place on their reading-room tables. It is desirable that all Greeks become familiar with these magazines and gain the broader knowledge of the fraternity world at large which a constant reader can obtain. No one magazine can cover all the pertinent topics of the time in a single volume but each one contributes its share to the general fund of information and a truly broad-minded fraternity woman should be familiar with several journals besides her own. There is no better way to gain the real Pan-Hellenic spirit.” I concur wholeheartedly!

*You can thank my husband who somehow managed to snag me into getting new tires, but didn’t spring this on me until I was already in St. Louis. (“Just get there before seven. They have the tires in stock and will be waiting for you.”) I had nothing with me to read while I waited for the tires to be installed, so I borrowed some magazines from Constance Dillon, Pi Beta Phi’s wonderful Arrow Editor. (And yes, I do know that the magazines are all available on line, but I am old school when it comes to magazines and books. There is a great joy in physically turning the pages.)

Posted in Alpha Chi Omega, Alpha Delta Pi, Alpha Gamma Delta, Alpha Gamma Delta Quarterly, Alpha Omicron Pi, Alpha Phi, Alpha Xi Delta, Chi Omega, Delta Delta Delta, Delta Gamma, Delta Zeta, Gamma Phi Beta, GLO, Greek-letter Organization, Greek-letter Organization History, Ida Shaw Martin, Kappa Alpha Theta, Kappa Alpha Theta (magazine), Kappa Delta, Kappa Kappa Gamma, National Panhellenic Conference, Notable Sorority Women, Phi Mu, Pi Beta Phi, Sigma Kappa, Sorority History, The Anchora of Delta Gamma, The Angelos of Kappa Delta, The Arrow of Pi Beta Phi, The Eleusis of Chi Omega, The Key of Kappa Kappa Gamma, The Lyre of Alpha Chi Omega, The Quill of Alpha Xi Delta, The Themis of Zeta Tau Alpha, The Trident of Delta Delta Delta, Zeta Tau Alpha | Tagged Florence Armstong, L. Pearle Green, National Panhellenic Confrence, NPC, NPC Editors, R. Louise Fitch | Comments Off

May 1 – Phi Gamma Delta’s Founders’ Day and FIJI Sires and Sons Anniversary

Posted on May 1, 2013 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

May 1, 1848 is the date of Phi Gamma Delta’s founding. John Templeton McCarty, Samuel Beatty Wilson, James Elliott, Daniel Webster Crofts, Ellis Bailey Gregg and Naaman Fletcher – the Immortal Six – were students at Jefferson College in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, when they founded the fraternity. The fraternity’s Beta chapter was established the same year at Washington College in Washington, Pennsylvania. The chapters became one when the colleges merged to form Washington and Jefferson College in 1865.

In the summer of 1920, a Phi Gamma Delta alumnus from the Amherst College chapter won the Vice Presidential spot on the Republican ticket for the 1920 election. At the time of the nomination, Massachusetts Governor Calvin Coolidge was at Amherst attending his 25^th college reunion and the 99^th anniversary of the college. A reception at the chapter house was arranged with his wife Grace Goodhue Coolidge, a Pi Beta Phi member, helping the chapter plan the event on short notice. More than 1,500 people – students, faculty, alumni, students and community members – attended.

Calvin Coolidge became President after the death of Warren G. Harding on August 2, 1923. The Coolidges were planning to attend Phi Gamma Delta’s 75^th anniversary celebration in Pittsburgh in September 1923, but the plans had to be cancelled. Later, a founders badge was presented to the President. On that occasion, President Coolidge said, “I am very glad to have this badge. My wife wears mine most of the time.”

On November 17, 1924, the Coolidges’ oldest son, John, became a member of his father’s Phi Gamma Delta chapter at Amherst College. On the following Founders’ Day, May 1, 1925, FIJI Sires and Sons was organized. Its purpose is to “impress upon all fathers and sons, who are members of the fraternity, and in time upon their sons, a realization of the noble trinity of principles of the fraternity, with the hope that they may outrun the fervor of youth.”

The Coolidge family – Calvin, Jr., Calvin, Grace, and John shortly before Calvin, Jr.’s death. Courtesy of the Library of Congress.

The idea was conceived on March 17, 1925 when T. Ludlow Chrystie and Fraternity Historian William F. Chamberlin discussed creating a list of all the fathers and sons who have been initiated into the Phi Gamma Delta. Chrystie, Chamberlin and three other men, Robert D. Williamson, Charles H. Bosler, and Abram S. Post, visited the White House. President Coolidge, Sire No. 1, signed the preamble of the organization. The men then joined the President for lunch at the White House.

There is no membership fee to be a member of Sires and Sons, but there is a suggested donation of $100 to receive a certificate. There are a limited amount of certificates signed by John Coolidge, who died in 2000; they are available for a $500 gift to the Phi Gamma Delta Educational Foundation. Half of the donation is then forwarded to the Calvin Coolidge Memorial Foundation in Plymouth Notch, Vermont.

“Phi Gamma Delta – Calvin Coolidge Fraternity – Amherst College, Mass.”

Posted in Amherst College, Calvin Coolidge, Founders' Day, GLO, Greek-letter Organization, Greek-letter Organization History, Phi Gamma Delta, Pi Beta Phi | Tagged Amherst College, Calvin Coolidge, Fiji, Phi Gamma Delta, Sires and Sons | Comments Off

Theta Phi Alpha’s Founders’ Day and Its Connection to a Saint

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

Theta Phi Alpha was founded at the University of Michigan on August 30, 1912. Its ten founders are Amelia McSweeney, Mildred M. Connely, May C. Ryan, Selma Gilday, Camilla Ryan Sutherland, Helen Ryan Quinlan, Katrina Caughey Ward, Dorothy Caughey Phalan, Otilia Leuchtweis O’Hara, and Eva Stroh Bauer Everson. It was founded as a sorority for Catholic women in a day when their social opportunities were sometimes limited depending on the campus environment. Today, the organization is open to women of all faiths.

Theta Phi Alpha celebrates Founders’ Day on April 30, the Feast Day of Saint Catherine of Siena.* Saint Catherine is the patroness of the organization and her motto, “Nothing great is ever achieved without much enduring,” is Theta Phi Alpha’s motto as well. Since 1937, Theta Phi Alpha has honored a non-member with the Siena Medal. A round gold medal with the organization’s coat of arms, it is inscribed in Greek with the motto.

The Siena Medal was established to recognize a woman of integrity and principled leadership, as well as grace and social change. In 2012, Elizabeth Smart was honored at the Centennial convention in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She was honored for her daily efforts to prove that “that there really is life after a tragic event” and her determination live her life to the fullest after her kidnapping.

For more info on Theta Phi Alpha’s founding, visit http://wp.me/p20I1i-lS

* Saint Catherine was canonized in 1461. From 1597 until 1628, the feast of Saint Catherine of Siena was celebrated on April 29, the date she died. In 1628, due to a conflict with the feast of Saint Peter of Verona, hers was moved to April 30. In 1969, it was changed back to April 29.

Posted in Founders' Day, GLO, Greek-letter Organization, Greek-letter Organization History, National Panhellenic Conference, Theta Phi Alpha, University of Michigan, Women's Fraternity History | Tagged Elizabeth Smart, Saint Catherine of Sienna, St. Catherine, Theta Phi Alpha, University of Michigan | Comments Off

Happy Founders’ Day, My Dear Pi Beta Phi!

Posted on April 28, 2013 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

When Monmouth College in Monmouth, Illinois opened in September 1856, 26 of the 99 students were women. Ten years later, when the 1866-67 academic year began, the cost of the first term was $12 in tuition and $9 for each additional term. There were no residence halls and students who hailed from outside of Monmouth sought board and lodging from local families. Two students, Ada Bruen and Libbie Brook, friends from Henderson County, found a room to share in the home of Jacob Holt.

It was in that southwest second-floor bedroom that the first national fraternity for women modeled after the Greek-letter fraternities of men was founded on April 28, 1867. There were chapters of Beta Theta Pi, Delta Tau Delta, and Phi Gamma Delta on campus and the women desired that kind of fellowship for themselves. There were literary societies on campus and the women belonged to them, but they wanted something far deeper and with sisterhood at its core.

The name they chose was I. C. Sorosis. Its grip was accompanied by the motto “Pi Beta Phi.” It is believed that Nancy Black selected those Greek letters as she was “the Greek scholar and was always coming up with a new idea.” Several chapters starting using the Greek letters prior to the official name change at the 1888 convention.

In that room in the Holt home, the ten young women who could make it to the first gathering elected Emma Brownlee as president. They made the motion to “always conceal and never reveal” the secrets of their fraternity for women. Within the confines of that small room, the women wrote a constitution and formulated goals; they wanted to “cultivate sincere friendship, establish the real objects of life, and promote the happiness of humanity.”

The twelve founders included two sisters, Emma Brownlee (Kilgore) and Clara Brownlee (Hutchinson), and their friends Ada Bruen (Grier), Nancy Black (Wallace), Inez Smith (Soule), Fannie Whitenack (Libbey), Libbie Brook (Gaddis), Rosa Moore, Jennie Horne (Turnbull), and Margaret Campbell. Two founders, Jennie Nicol and Fannie Thomson, were unable to attend but agreed to go along with whatever the other ten decided.

Libbie Brook enrolled at Iowa Wesleyan University in Mount Pleasant, Iowa, with the intention of starting another I. C. chapter. She was successful and in December 1868, Iowa Alpha was chartered.

Fannie Whitenack Libbey later said of those early days, “our first secret was our birthplace. It was quite generally believed that we were a chapter from an Eastern College…a secret we kept for fifteen years. THEN, it was our greatest secret; now, however, that we are ALPHA Chapter is our greatest pride.”

Pi Beta Phi was founded at Holt House in Monmouth, Illinois

Posted in Beta Theta Pi, Delta Tau Delta, Founders' Day, GLO, Greek-letter Organization, Greek-letter Organization History, Monmouth College, Phi Gamma Delta, Pi Beta Phi, Sorority History, Women's Fraternity History | Tagged Founders' Day, Monmouth College, Pi Beta Phi | Comments Off

David Starr Jordan, Lombard College, and a Forget Me Not Book

Posted on April 26, 2013 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

The book from the 1870s was titled “Forget Me Not.” It was filled with pages and pages of poems and signatures, many in ornate script, some faded by time, and others hard to decipher without a magnifying glass. The former owner was a graduate of Lombard College in Galesburg, Illinois. I kept turning the pages until the name “David Starr Jordan” caught my eye.

I recognized his name from one of the best classes I took in grad school – Jeff Aper’s “History of Higher Education.” David Starr Jordan was one of the boy wonders of his time. The Stanfords, Senator Leland and his wife Jane, took their private train car to Bloomington, Indiana, to woo Jordan away from the Indiana University presidency and crown him president of the university they created as a memorial to their son, Leland Junior.

Could the same David Starr Jordan have penned this little ditty to a student at Lombard College in Galesburg, Illinois?

I’m no great hand at palaver,

And saying things pretty and sweet.

Whether I mean them or not you know,

To everybody I meet.

I shall not call you an “angel.”

Nor even the “Queen of Girls:”

Nor say that the Light of Heaven

Is shimmering through your curls.

But if I say, “I like you.”

The simple truth I tell

And truth is ever a Pearl, my dear,

Though it be in an Oyster shell.

David Starr Jordan

Lombard, June 13th, ’73.

Born in upstate New York in 1851, Jordan was among the first students at Cornell University. There, he became a member of Delta Upsilon Fraternity. In 1872, Jordan graduated from Cornell with a Bachelor’s degree and a Master’s degree in botany; he was also a commencement speaker that year.

After graduation, he took a teaching job at Lombard College and spent the 1872-73 academic year there. He apparently caught flack from the trustees for teaching students about the geological ages and he left the school after only one year.

He spent the next few summers at Louis Agassiz’s school. Agassiz, a naturalist, geologist and one of the foremost scientists of his time, fostered Jordan’s interest in ichthyology (the study of fish). Agassiz also opposed Charles Darwin’s theories, but Jordan became a believer in them. Jordan spent a year at Wisconsin’s Appleton Collegiate Institute serving as principal and worked another year teaching high school science in Indianapolis, Indiana. He then spent a year studying medicine and earned a medical degree in 1875. At the 1875 Delta Upsilon convention at Rutgers University, he was elected Poet of the fraternity.

He joined the faculty at Northwestern Christian University (now Butler University) and obtained a Ph.D. In 1879, he was hired at Indiana University.

In 1885, Jordan became the seventh President of Indiana University: he served until 1891. In those days, college presidents were jacks of all trades – fundraisers, administrators, keepers of the key to the library – and yet Jordan was able to keep up with his research interests. More than 2,500 species of fish were discovered by Jordan and his students. He also left his mark on Indiana University, doubling enrollment and instituting the elective system of college courses.

Senator Leland Stanford and his wife Jane chose him to be the first president of Stanford University. He served in that capacity from 1891-1916. On December 28, 1905, he was a speaker at the Denver Delta Upsilon Alumni Club meeting at the “magnificent new” Savoy Hotel. As he left, after his talk, to make his way to another engagement, the attendees sang, “He’s a jolly good fellow.”

In 1925, Jordan was an expert witness in the Scopes Trial. He died in 1931.

And, for what it is worth, there is no doubt in my mind that Delta Upsilon’s Poet penned the poem for a student’s memory book while he was on the faculty at Lombard College.

Posted in Cornell University, Delta Upsilon, GLO, Greek-letter Organization, Greek-letter Organization History, Lombard College, NIC, North-American Interfraternity Conference, Stanford University, University of Indiana | Tagged Cornell University, David Starr Jordan, Lombard College, Stanford University, University of Indiana | Comments Off

Fraternity and Sorority Members Lobby on Capitol Hill – April 24, 2013

Posted on April 24, 2013 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

On April 24, 2013, 200 fraternity and sorority members, collegiate and alumni (of the men’s groups)/alumnae (of the women’s groups), will be Washington D.C. to lobby on Capitol Hill. The Fraternal Government Relations Coalition (FGRC), is a group bringing together the National Panhellenic Conference (NPC), the North-American Interfraternity Conference (NIC), and the Fraternity and Sorority Political Action Committee (FSPAC).

This year, the FGRC’s focus is the Collegiate Housing and Infrastructure Act of 2013 (CHIA S 781). If enacted it would make a simple change in the tax code. This change would allow tax deductible status to donations made to fraternity and sorority educational foundations for use in infrastructure improvements and the installation of fire detection/ prevention systems in local not-for-profit student housing.

Campus residence halls were not available when a good many of the Greek-letter organizations present at this lobby effort were founded. Providing room and board for members, especially during the late 1800s and early 1900s, was a vital role provided by these organizations. That role is still a very important one. Each year, fraternities and sororities provide housing for more than 250,000 college students; one out of every eight college students lives in a fraternity or sorority house. Allowing alumni/ae the opportunity to donate funds on a tax-deductible basis will help improve fraternity and sorority housing. If CHIA is enacted, it is estimated that it will inject an estimated $300 million dollars into the construction industry throughout the United States.

You can follow the lobbying effort on twitter using hashtags #passCHIA and #GreekDC. Contributions to the Fraternity and Sorority Political Action Committee can be made at www.fspac.org.

A sorority house on a midwestern campus. This chapter house, along with countless others on campuses all across the country would greatly benefit by the enactment of CHIA S 781.

Posted in GLO, Greek-letter Organization, Greek-letter Organization History, Men's Fraternities, National Panhellenic Conference, NIC, North-American Interfraternity Conference, Women's Fraternity History | Tagged CHIA, FGRC, FSPAC, GreekDC, NIC, NPC, Washington DC | Comments Off

The Early History of the Women’s Fraternity System at the University of Kansas

Posted on April 22, 2013 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

By 1870, eight state universities accepted women; these institutions were the Universities of Kansas, Iowa, Wisconsin, Indiana, Minnesota, Missouri, Michigan, and California (Newcomer, 1959). Women’s fraternities provided the female students with a support system in an educational environment that was sometimes hostile to them, especially during the early years of coeducation.

In 1873, the Kansas Alpha chapter of Pi Beta Phi came into existence through the labors of Sara Richardson, a member of the Pi Beta Phi chapter at Lombard College in Galesburg, Illinois. Richardson had spent the summer of 1872 at home in Lawrence, Kansas. She had three sisters who were enrolled at Kansas University. When, in the spring of 1873, Richardson found that some Kansas men were forming a chapter of Beta Theta Pi, she informed her Kansas sisters and friends. The Kansas Alpha chapter of Pi Beta Phi was chartered on April 1, 1873 with seven members, including May, Flora, and Alma Richardson (Flora would be the University’s first valedictorian).

The first meetings were held in the University’s music room on Thursday afternoons with the janitor supplying the key to unlock the doors (Richardson, 1885). The chapter’s first party at Kansas University, one to honor Sara Richardson, was dubbed by the Chancellor, John Fraser, as a “Cookie Shine,” a tradition that was quickly adopted to other chapters and to this day continues to be a special part of membership in Pi Beta Phi.

Charter member Gertrude Boughton Blackwelder[1] (1914) described the women who formed the chapter, “Forty years ago a young woman pursuing a college course found herself the target for many criticisms and queries. She was risking her health for the sake of a little learning, – she was crowding her mind with a mass of information much of it utterly useless, – her interests were being called away from the traditional sphere of women – to marry and bear children, – and what was to be the outcome? It was difficult, I remember, for us to find replies to these questions. We had to confess our inability to see clearly a definite use for the higher mathematics, for a knowledge of science, that elusive and ever-changing study, – for the dates and facts of history we were so industriously acquiring, – the smattering of art, languages, etc. etc. But we had entered a field hitherto denied to women, and we must prove our ability to cope with men in intellectual work. We studied because we were eager to know things, and the utilitarian side of the matter troubled us little. President Hadley of Yale has illuminated the subject by saying “that you can teach a student to study things that he is not going to use by methods that he is going to use.” So it seems to-day that our minds were developed and trained by the work we did and by the efforts to master the subjects which had been the traditional province of men.” (pp. 312-313)

The Kappa chapter of Kappa Alpha Theta at the University of Kansas came into beginning in a most round about manner. A letter of inquiry was sent to the Eta chapter in Ann Arbor rather than Alpha chapter at DePauw University. Eta member Lee Bird visited Lawrence, Kansas, to install the chapter and on March 18, 1881, the Kappa chapter was installed. Four years later the chapter took on the task of publishing the first edition of the Kappa Alpha Theta Journal[2] (Dodge, 1930).

In the early 1880s a group of women discussed forming a third women’s fraternity on the University of Kansas campus. A fraternity man on campus had a fraternity brother whose wife was a Kappa Kappa Gamma alumna. Through this contact, on December 17, 1883, the Omega chapter was installed with eight charter members (Walker, 1903).

Kappa Chapter of Kappa Alpha Theta, University of Kansas, late 1800s

Notable University of Kansas alumnae initiated into National Panhellenic Conference organizations prior to 1902.

Alden, Jenette Hubbard Bolles, D. O., University of Kansas Pi Beta Phi, 1885, physician. One of the first woman to study osteopathy, she graduated from the American School of Osteopathy at Kirksville, Missouri, in 1894. She became a member of the first class ever organized to teach osteopathy at the American School of Osteopathy and was a professor at the school from 1893-1895. She headed the departments of anatomy, gynecology and obstetrics at the Colorado College of Osteopathy from 1897 until 1904. Beginning in 1904, Alden was in private practice with her husband in Denver, Colorado (Pomeroy, 1909).

Berry, Josephine Thorndike, University of Kansas, Pi Beta Phi, 1893, hotel executive. After spending many years teaching home economics at the collegiate level, Berry became the builder and operator of Thorndike Hall, an apartment hotel for women in Kansas City, Missouri (Howes, 1939).

Clarke, Edith M., University of Kansas Kappa Alpha Theta, 1895, Phi Beta Kappa, librarian at the University of Kansas (Bell, 1902).

Crotty-Davenport, Gertrude, University of Kansas Pi Beta Phi, 1889, scientist. She assisted her husband who was head of the biological station at the Carnegie Institute at Cold Spring Harbor, New York. She co-authored a book entitled Introduction to zoology (Bartol-Theiss, 1919).

Goss, Alice Morgan, M.D., University of Kansas Pi Beta Phi, 1875, physician. She started medical studies at San Francisco Homeopathic School and was later graduated from the Chicago Hahnemann College. Specializing in the diseases of women and children, she was in private practice in San Francisco from 1890 until 1930. (Pomeroy, 1909; “In memoriam,” 1935).

Haskell, Carrie Goss, M.D., University of Kansas Pi Beta Phi, 1873. She attended St. Louis Medical College in 1875 and the Hahnemann Homeopathic College of Chicago, from which she received a medical degree in 1878. She was in private practice in several California cities (Pomeroy, 1909).

Lockwood, Laura E., Ph.D., University of Kansas Kappa Kappa Gamma, professor. She received her Ph.D. from Yale University, wrote a lexicon on Milton’s use of words and taught at Wellesley College (“Kappas known to fame,” 1915, October).

Merrill, Katherine, University of Kansas Kappa Alpha Theta, 1889, Assistant Professor in English at the University of Illinois (Bell, 1902).

Miles-Woodward, Josephine, University of Kansas Pi Beta Phi, 1882, journalist. She was a war correspondent for the Cincinnati Commercial Gazette during the Spanish-American War and was the first woman sent to the island in that capacity. She obtained an interview with General Weyler (Bartol-Theiss, 1919

Rohe, Alice, University of Kansas Pi Beta Phi, 1896, journalist. She was the feature writer at the New York Evening World for five years (Bartol-Theiss, 1919).

Schaum, Madge, D. D. S., University of Kansas Kappa Alpha Theta, 1895, dentist. She studied dentistry in Chicago and was a practicing dentist (Bell, 1902).

Simpson, Mamie, University of Kansas Kappa Alpha Theta, artist. In 1888, she had a painting accepted by the Paris Salon. After returning from European study, she began teaching oil painting at the University of Kansas (“Personals,” 1888) .

Walker, Mary L. Simpson, University of Kansas Kappa Alpha Theta, 1891, Professor of Art at Kansas State University (Bell, 1902).

[1] In 1893, she read a paper before the Congress of Women’s Fraternities at the 1893 Colombian Exposition in Chicago (Spring, 1936).

[2] The Key of Kappa Kappa Gamma and The Arrow of Pi Beta Phi also had their beginnings at the University of Kansas. There is a blog post on is site about it.

From Coeducation and the History of Women’s Fraternities 1867-1902 by Frances DeSimone Becque, 2002. (c) Fran Becque, www.fraternityhistorycom.

Posted in GLO, Greek-letter Organization, Greek-letter Organization History, Kappa Alpha Theta, Kappa Kappa Gamma, National Panhellenic Conference, Pi Beta Phi, Sorority History, University of Kansas | Tagged Kappa Alpha Theta, Kappa Kappa Gamma, Pi Beta Phi, University of Kansas | Comments Off

Happy Founders’ Day Tri Sigma – Its Robbie Page Memorial Fund Honors a National President’s Son

Posted on April 19, 2013 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

Sigma Sigma Sigma was founded on April 20, 1898, at the State Female Normal School in Farmville, Virginia (now Longwood University). The founders are Lucy Wright, Margaret Batten, Elizabeth Watkins, Louise Davis, Martha Trent Featherston, Lelia Scott, Isabella Merrick, and Sallie Michie.

Mabel Lee Walton, a charter member of the Gamma chapter at Randolph-Macon Woman’s College, served as the sorority’s third National President from 1913-1947. She also served as the President of the Association of Education Sororities before Sigma Sigma Sigma became a member of the National Panhellenic Conference in 1947.

Tri Sigma’s fourth president, Mary Hastings Holloway Page (Lovejoy), was Walton’s niece. A member of the Alpha chapter, she was initiated with the gold Tri Sigma badge that belonged to her “Aunt May.” While working in Washington, D.C., she met a gentleman from New Hampshire, Robertson Page, and they married in April 1940.

The Pages’ son, Robertson Page II was born on May 1, 1946. According the Years Remember of Sigma Sigma Sigma 1898-1953, “Robbie was six weeks old when he attended his first Sigma officers’ conference, two months old when his father first saw him (his father was on special assignment in Germany), and six months old when he attended the Regional Meet at Richmond, Virginia, where his mother was officer-in-charge.” A devoted Tri Sigma from the minute she pledged the organization, she was elected National President in 1947.

The Pages lived in Massachusetts when Robbie attended his first day of kindergarten. It was also his last day of school. The next morning he had what the doctors described as an overwhelming case of bulbar poliomyelitis, a form of polio. Four days later, on September 15, 1951, he died in an iron lung. His bereaved parents wanted to help spare other parents the pain they so intensely felt at the loss of their precious young son and Tri Sigmas the country over wanted to do something to ease the family’s pain. The Robbie Page Memorial Fund was created to fund medical research.

Robertson “Robbie” Page II

Today’s collegians have no idea what the world was like when polio could strike in the blink of an eye. The Robbie Page Memorial Fund became Tri Sigma’s official philanthropy in 1954. The Fund helped during the Salk vaccine trials. When polio was essentially defeated in the United States, the focus of the Fund changed to “therapeutic play,” when that was a relatively new field. Today, the fund helps supports play therapy for hospitalized children and libraries, playrooms, and programs at hospitals where children undergo long-term care. The National Therapeutic Recreation Society has recognized Tri Sigma for its support of Child Life and Play Therapy programs.