The History of Pinnings?
Calling all alumni! Perhaps Tom and Erik most specifically...
So a pledge brother of mine pinned his girlfriend on Monday night. I drove down from Omaha to see it and party afterwards, had a great time, yada;yada;yada.
You could tell that this was an important event for him, b/c he was somewhat flustered, and the ceremony was somewhat disorganized, although really touching and emotional.
So I thought to myself, perhaps I could write a quick guideline to a pinning ceremony (not that it would ever be used in my chapter...we've only had 3 in 5 years...some chapters - SigEp - have like that many in April alone...anyways)
So, I was wondering if anyone knew the history behind pinnings? For some reason I vaguely remember some silver grey saying how back in the 30s-50s it was basically signifying that the young woman was almost ready to "take care of" her future husband...by this I mean that mothers were invited to pledging ceremonies in order to pin the pledge button on the young man, signifying she was transferring care of her son to the fraternity. Later when her son had found that special girl, he pinned her and it represented that she was going to take care of him soon (pinning = engagement precursor) and the fraternity had "done its job".
Again, I'm not sure when or where I heard or even if I just made it up somehow. Obviously, it's sexist and quaint by today's standards, but doesn't seem all that farfetched. I also realize that this is probably something that is highly variable from campus to campus (just like everything else on GC). but if this explanation, or any other credible explanations exist, I think it would be interesting to add to my little ceremony schedule.
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