This photo is from Ordinary Miracles. You can see Charlie under the tree towards the left.
I can't find it in my early KD history books right now but some of the first initiates talk about it...sneaking around the school late at night, stealing Charlie from the science department and trying not to get caught. Charlie was there to make the atmosphere spooky.
Clearly this was all before they had any clue about what kind of standard ritual they wanted. It sounds like the early days were a lot of silly fun.
Okay, so we'll leave the fraternity/sorority question for a while.
New question: Who designed (and redesigned) our Kappa Delta Badge?