Here's the story behind Sigma Kappa

Colby College in Waterville, Maine was the first college in New England to admit women on an equal basis with men students. The first woman student was admitted in 1871, and for two years Mary Caffrey Low was the only woman student at Colby College. In 1873, four more young women from Maine, Elizabeth Gorham Hoag, Ida Fuller, Frances Mann and Louise Helen Coburn were admitted to Colby and the five young women found themselves together frequently. During the school year of 1873-74, the five young women decided to form a literary and social society. They were told by the college administration that they needed to present a constitution and bylaws with a petition requesting permission to form Sigma Kappa Sorority. They began work during that year with an eager glow of enthusiasm. Their purpose at the outset was that the sorority should become what it is now, a national organization of college women. On November 9, 1874, the five young women received a letter from the faculty approving their petition. Thus, this date has since been considered our Founder's Day.

Wow I love this thread...so interesting! Even more interesting is to think that one person's idea becomes what the group is today. :)

Here's why SAI was founded (pulled from the SAI website, www.sai-national.org)

"In early spring of 1903, Mrs. Fredreka Howland, wife of William Howland, head of the Vocal Department of the University School of Music, Ann Arbor, Michigan, suggested that a musical sorority be organized which would aim for high standards of musicianship and for promotion of the highest type of music. She felt there was a need for such an organization. A meeting was held in Mr. Howland's studio to discuss this idea. There was some talk of a musical club but finally a Sorority was decided upon as better fitting plans for close bonds of friendship. It was decided that only students of fine character and special musical talent combined with excellent scholarship would be eligible for membership. On June 12, 1903, Sigma Alpha Iota Musical Sorority was founded. Following are the names of the founders, who were graduate students and faculty members: Elizabeth A. Campbell, Frances Caspari, Minnie M. Davis (Sherrill), Leila H. Farlin (Laughlin), Nora Crane Hunt, Georgina Potts and Mary Storrs (Andersen).

We were essentially founded as an opposition organization to another group (the precursor organization of ATO) in which hazing had gotten out of hand. That's a long story made very short.

Quoted from the 2003 edition of the Phoenix (our pledge manual), pg. 176-177:

To add to dardenr's earlier post, check the quote in the signature

From Alphaphi.org:

Brave hearts filled with a noble purpose whose eyes saw clearly into the future

At a time when society looked upon women only as daughters, wives, and mothers—and therefore not in need of higher education—our ten founders were pioneers of the coeducational system. Attending school with the handicap of implied, if not open, opposition, our founders sought support from each other.

There was a need for a social center, a place of conference, a tie which should unite, a circle of friends who could sympathize with one another in their perplexities. They formed Alpha Phi in 1872 at Syracuse University.

Today, Alpha Phi continues to provide a "tie which unites, a circle of friends" for women young and old all around the world. From hand to hand and heart to heart, we are all grateful and proud of the legacy left to us by our founders.

Alpha Phi
 

Edited to delete post and add: Oops, guess great minds think alike!

Taken from the ZTA national website:

Zeta Tau Alpha was founded October 15, 1898, by nine women at the State Female Normal School in Farmville, Virginia. Only 14-15 years of age, these young women desired permanence to their friendships and hoped to perpetuate their sisterhood long after college. Though dedicated to the formation of a Greek-letter group, the band of nine delayed selecting a formal name. A temporary name of "???" was taken when, as legend has it, a member of another group met with the Founders. Raising her eyebrows and forming her fingers in the shape of a question mark, she asked "Who are you?" In unison, the group answered "Yes, Who? Who? Who?" Thus, the group came to be known as "???" while they sought an appropriate Greek name and symbols. During this time, the group received valuable assistance from two of the members' brothers - Maud's brother, Plummer Jones, and Frances Yancey Smith's brother Giles Mebane Smith. Both were students at the college of William and Mary, members of men's Greek-letter organizations and knowledgeable of Greek lore. After a year of careful contemplation, the group chose the formal name, the patron goddess and the badge.

Our 9 founders:

Maud Jones Horner, Died 1920
Della Lewis Hundley, Died July 12, 1951
Alice Bland Coleman, Died June 11, 1956
Mary Jones Batte, Died December 3, 1957
Alice Grey Welsh, Died June 21, 1960
Ethel Coleman Van Name, Died January 24, 1964
Helen M. Crafford, Died September 17, 1964
Frances Yancey Smith, Died April 23, 1977
Ruby Leigh Orgain, Died October 22, 1984

JEEZE, this is so great to see and find out the History of Other Greek Orgs!!:cool:

Most of us only know ours and with out looking them all up, this gives a little insight to others!:)

Thank you and Please keep it coming!:cool:

Basically, the reason any Greek Org. was Founded Then as Now, was a feel for a need to have something New!

I feel privilaged to have been one who did, so that makes me feel what the Ones back when did the the same thing and the ones who are doing it to this day!:cool:

In Animal House Voice: "IS THIS GREAT OR WHAT"!;)

The Place of Our Origin

Richmond College, where Sigma Phi Epsilon was founded in the early 20th century, was at the time attended by a mere 200 students, and perhaps between a third and a half of this number belonged to five fraternities. Kappa Alpha Order had come there in 1870, Phi Kappa Sigma in 1873, Phi Gamma Delta in 1890, Pi Kappa Alpha in 1891, and Kappa Sigma in 1898. Phi Delta Theta, Sigma Chi, and Sigma Alpha Epsilon also had established chapters there, which had expired. The little Baptist college was founded in 1830, and many of its graduates became Baptist ministers.

Most of the national fraternities, as their histories show, have been established simply because they were needed. The desire for brotherhood was in young men's souls. Sigma Phi Epsilon was founded because twelve young collegians hungered for a campus fellowship based on Judeo/Christian ideals that neither the college community nor the fraternity system at the time could offer. Sigma Phi Epsilon was needed.

Sigma Phi Epsilon Founded

Carter Ashton Jenkens, the 18-year-old son of a minister, had been a student at Rutgers University, New Jersey, where he had joined Chi Phi Fraternity. When he transferred to Richmond College in the fall of 1900, he sought companions to take the place of the Chi Phi brothers he had left behind at Rutgers. During the course of the term, he found five men who had already been drawn into a bond of informal fellowship, and he urged them to join him in applying for a charter of Chi Phi at Richmond College. They agreed, and the request for a charter was forwarded to Chi Phi only to meet with refusal because Chi Phi felt that Richmond College, as any college with less than 300 students was too small for the establishment of a Chi Phi chapter.

Wanting to maintain their fellowship, the six men, Jenkens, Benjamin Gaw, William Carter, William Wallace, Thomas Wright, and William Phillips, decided to form their own local fraternity.

Link to the Rest of the History

Adopted from various sources available on Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia’s national web-page.

Sinfonia was born on October 6, 1898, at the New England Conservatory in Boston, when a group of thirteen young men under the guidance of Ossian Everett Mills met "to consider the social life of the young men students of that institution" and "to devise ways and means by which it might be improved." Mills, bursar of the Conservatory, sought to create an Order in which men with a shared love of music could develop the virtues of manhood in themselves and in their fellows. He was profoundly interested in the physical, mental, moral, and spiritual development of the Conservatory students and recognized that a large proportion of them intended to put their musical knowledge into the church either as organists or singers. Mills felt that this class of people, as much as any, needed to be men of high ideals.

Nineteen days later, the new-born fraternity adopted the following philosophy of existence, which still guides the Fraternity: "The Object of this Fraternity shall be for the development of the best and truest fraternal spirit; the mutual welfare and brotherhood of musical students; the advancement of music in America and a loyalty to the Alma Mater."

European Beginnings

Kappa Sigma Fraternity was originally founded as a secret society of students at the University of Bologna in the year 1400. The group was founded by Manuel Chrysoloras, a Greek scholar, who taught at the University. In that day of city-states, the group's initial purpose was mutual protection of its members against physical attack and robbery by the unscrupulous governor of the city, Baldassare Cossa. In 1400, Chrysoloras and his five disciples formed a society for mutual protection which inspired the Ritual and beliefs of modern day Kappa Sigma.

Kappa Sigma in America was founded one chilly evening in the fall of 1869, as five students attending the University of Virginia in Charlottesville gathered in William Grigsby McCormick's room at 46 East Lawn and planted the seed of Brotherhood. For many weeks the bonds of friendship had drawn these five together; now the need became clear for a formal structure to contain their feelings. Thus, not only did the Founders formalize their friendship, but they also created a fraternity steeped in the traditions of the past and dedicated to the Pursuit of Learning. The new brothers recorded their bond in a Constitution and in an Oath which set forth the ideals and principles to all Kappa Sigmas today.


The Golden Hearted Virginian

Stephen Alonzo Jackson is regarded as possibly the most important man in Kappa Sigma's history. Through his efforts a struggling local fraternity became a strong national organization. He was the architect of out Ritual, writer of our Constitution, and was our first Worthy Grand Master. The following is and excerpt from the Bononia Docet, our pledge manual:

Stephen Alonzo Jackson is regarded as possibly the most important man in Kappa Sigma's history. Through his efforts a struggling local fraternity became a strong national organization. He was the architect of out Ritual, writer of our Constitution, and was our first Worthy Grand Master. The following is and excerpt from the Bononia Docet, our pledge manual:

"Gentle as a woman, firm as a rock - a perfect bundle of nervous energy. His love of the Fraternity knew no bounds, and his enthusiasm was so contagious that it influenced everybody who came within his reach. His one ambition was to make Kappa Sigma the leading college fraternity of the world, and to that end he thought and worked by day and night, until the end of his busy life."

During the Fraternity's second Grand Conclave in 1878 in Richmond, Virginia, Jackson was reelected as Worthy Grand Master. In his speech, he expressed his ideal and goal of an enduring and expanding brotherhood as he addressed the Order:

"Why not, my Brothers, since we of today live and cherish the principles of the Kappa Sigma Fraternity, throw such a halo around those principles that they may be handed down as a precious heirloom to ages yet unborn? Why nor put our apples of gold in pictures of silver? May we not rest contentedly until the Star and Crescent is the pride of every college and university in the land!"

Jackson died on March 4, 1892. His legacy to the Fraternity included its Ritual, a revised Constitution, a precedent-setting Grand Conclave, the first southern Fraternity to extend a chapter to the north, and above all else, a spirit for expansion.

Today, Kappa Sigma comprises over 200 chapters and colonies in both the United States and Canada, with over 200,000 men. Kappa sigma is the sixth largest fraternity and have approximately 150,000 brothers in North America.

The early 1900's were turbulent times. Racial vindictiveness emerged as a result of earlier waves of emigration, and divisions developed along religious, ethnic, and economic lines. The city of New York was seen as a cauldron for social change.

In 1913, our Founders — Lillian Gordon, Ethel Gordon, Josephine Ellison, Shirley Cohen, Fay Chertkoff, Claire Wunder, Estelle Melnick, Rose Sher, Jeanette Lipka, and Gwen “Rae” Zaliels — approached the Dean of Women at Hunter College in New York City with a vision. They wanted to start a sorority that would promote open membership to all women of character regardless of background; a sorority committed to sisterhood, excellence in scholarship, and selfless giving.

On November 26, 1913, Phi Sigma Sigma was born, unobtrusively, without the thought of expansion. It was the first nonsectarian sorority; the only one that was open to diverse membership from inception and the only one with a ritual that was not based in scripture. Under the leadership of Fay Chertkoff (our first chapter archon), Alpha Chapter was installed at Hunter College.

As stated from our website :), easier to do than typing it in my own words!!

ALPHA NU OMEGA SORORITY INC.
 

The Lord moved on the hearts and minds of many of the attendees of the meeting to help in the manifestation of the vision of Alpha Nu Omega. The first fruits of Alpha Nu Omega consisted of 14 founding brothers and 15 founding sisters. Collectively they labored along with the Visionary Founder Shirley K. Russell in establishing the Constitution of Alpha Nu Omega. This step enabled the organization to be incorporated on December 20, 1988, 47 days after the founding date. The National Headquarters was at this time established at Morgan State University in Baltimore, Maryland.
Many crucial decisions were made by the Founders of Alpha Nu Omega, Inc. in regard to the administration of the organization. One decision called for the organization to operate as two distinct entities (a fraternity and a sorority) bound by a single constitution. At that time two executive boards were established - Founder Doral R. Pulley presided as the president of the fraternity, and Founder Joyce Mungo presided as the president of the sorority. Visionary Founder Shirley K. Russell remained the advisor to the brother/sister organization.
In October of 1989, the organization inducted its first line consisting of one brother and six sisters. The second line for the sisters was held in the fall of 1990. The sisters increased their membership by five.
In the Spring of 1991 the entire Alpha Nu Omega Family met and decided to become a non-hazing organization. They adopted an intake curriculum now known as the Orientation Process. This decision lead to the rapid addition of membership.
Change has taken place in Alpha Nu Omega on several occasions, but the brothers and sisters of Alpha Nu Omega Inc. hold to God's promise of membership growth and leadership in ministry. This will come through spiritual growth, which is found by walking in the Spirit and pressing toward the mark of the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. (Phillipians 3:14)