Writing a Chapter History

[barbino]

Originally Posted by macallan25

I saw our complete history when I was at the SAE temple in Evanston, Ill. Pretty crazy.....very extensive piece of work, many volumes.

Evanston is a Chicago suburb (the first suburb north).
This is in my "neighborhood" & now you have me wanting to visit the SAE temple. I've never gone inside, though I've gone past it many times. I'd love to look at the SAE history - I'm somewhat of a history buff. I believe that Sigma Chi's headquarters is in Evanston, too (and I know that Alpha Phi's is). These are all on or very near to Northwestern University's campus.

The University of Chicago (Hyde Park) area of Chicago on the South side of the city is where the Alpha Kappa Alpha's headquarters is located. Sometimes I take Chicago for granted because so much is right around me that I forget that it is there. Thanks for reminding me, I'll let you know about that visit.

[bellwisdom]

I was chapter historian 2 semesters ago and needed to provide a chapter history for our new website. Well I wanted to do more than just a few paragraphs, I wanted to put together something big. I did everything in a timeline format but there was lots of stuff missing because information was hard to come by. I actually got more info from the University Archives, the University Yearbooks, and Greek Affairs. The chapter only had a one page paper about the chapter history so it wasnt as much help and the IHQ only had info that I already knew. I was also able to get even more info from the surrounding undergrad and alumni chapters too. It wasnt as successful as I wanted but I learned a lot more and added more to that one page history that we originally had. I also convinced the Chapter to add to the duties of the Chapter Historian, Alumni chair, and pledge class vice president's so that they are keeping something similar to a monthly log of what is going on so that 50 years from now no more info is lost if another historian has to write a Chapter History. If you have a National Historian I'm sure that could have great advise too.

[honeychile]

Another chapter sister* & I wrote our chapter's history while we were still in school. One "fun" thing we added was interviewing at least one alumna from each decade. We asked about songs, traditions, and how much some things cost (tuition, dues, basic cost of living items).

If I could make one suggestion to someone tackling their chapter history, I would remind them that, just as you'd get several points of view from interviewing current sisters, you'll get different opinions from other decades. It's best to try to get at least 2-3 commentaries for each decade.


*For those who have read my story about Sarai, she's the sister who wrote this with me.

[RACooper]

One other source of information usually neglected is talking to the involved alumni from other GLOs on campus (particularlly in the 'tighter' Greek community campuses) ~ you'd be surprised at the amount of information that can come directly or indirectly from these talks.

[Senusret I]

Originally Posted by RACooper

One other source of information usually neglected is talking to the involved alumni from other GLOs on campus (particularlly in the 'tighter' Greek community campuses) ~ you'd be surprised at the amount of information that can come directly or indirectly from these talks.

I am very glad that you mentioned this. I have always tried to maintain cordial relationships with Delta Phi Epsilon Professional Foreign Service Fraternity alumni -- all of the charter members of APO on my campus were in the school of foreign service, and there were many DPE/APO dual members in the early days.

One DPE alum in particular has been really helpful and I hope to meet him for lunch or something over the summer.

[honeychile]

Originally Posted by RACooper

One other source of information usually neglected is talking to the involved alumni from other GLOs on campus (particularlly in the 'tighter' Greek community campuses) ~ you'd be surprised at the amount of information that can come directly or indirectly from these talks.

Good idea! I wish we had thought of that.

We did ask who the campus rivals were, and which fraternities were "special" to the chapter at the time.

ETA: AND, which fraternities and sororities were on campus at the time, and what the numbers were like.

[Senusret I]

Found out one of my charter members was black!

[Senusret I]

Thank you, rbethea!

Well, here's a bit of an update....

We have been VERY BLESSED with the access we have to old yearbooks, Torch & Trefoils, and NOW we've discovered that The Hoya (campus newspaper) has a digital catalog available for free on the internet!

The level of detail we can now provide in our chapter history is amazing. In the course of this project, I've discovered our chapter's connection to Tong-Sun Park, Madame Nhu, a House inquiry on internal security, a murder, and more!

But to find out how it all fits together, you'll just have to wait!

[Maat]

best of luck with the project

[Senusret I]

Bumping this because I'm not sure if I mentioned it elsewhere....

This project was completed in three parts:

1) The first major version was placed on our chapter's website.

2) The second major version was made into a hard cover book through Blurb (I think).

3) The final major version is being printed as a major portion of the souvenir journal for our chapter's 55th anniversary celebration.

After the couple of years of principal writing, the chapter got into the habit of adding to the end of the document, so now it has about four authors, along with "and Historians of [our chapter]" at the end.

The chapter won the national historian's award based largely on this project, as well as sectional awards for alumni association/chapter collaboration AND the first Randolph Finder Historian's Award (named for GC poster naraht).

It was fun and I'm looking forward to seeing everyone's reaction to having the history in their hands.