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Originally posted by PhoenixAzul
Did they branch out from eachother? Or do they just happen to share letters and have no historical ties?
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No, they just happen to share letters and have no historical ties. And both fraternities are members of the North-American Interfraternity Conference.
Kappa Alpha Society was founded at Union College in Schenectady, New York in 1825 and is the oldest of the existing social fraternities. Kappa Alpha Order was founded at Washington College - now Washington & Lee University - in Lexington, Virginia in 1865 and originally was called Phi Kappa Chi.
An interesting historical tidbit is that soon after the founding of Phi Kappa Chi, the members changed their name to Kappa Alpha Order. Largely due to a request by Phi Kappa Psi fraternity that already existed on campus. The general feeling was that the letters of the two groups were 'too similar'.
So ironically, there are now two different social fraternities with the same Greek letters - Kappa Alpha Society and Kappa Alpha Order.