Historical connections to other orgs?

[georgewallace3]

Mother Mu

March 9, 1856

Tuscaloosa, Alabama

[AndreaJo8648]

My sorority is local and we are connected to our brothers because they started us when there original sisters, Kappa Delta Kappa were disbanded in 1986
Quite original my brothers, they are sigma omega sigma so they just change ours to Sigma Delta Sigma

[Coramoor]

I have read the history that Betarulz and Deltalum are talking about. I wish I had it on hand right this moment so I could quote it exactly.

One source I do have on hand is from a 1930's addition of The Beta Book. It mentions that 5 men initiated into Beta had been members of a local organization by the name of Delta Tau Delta. Of the five (J.D. Lowe, J.L.N. Hunt, William R. Cunningham, Thomas T. Holtan, and Benjamin S. Keene) two resigned so they could be counted as founders of DTD. Those two being Cunningham and Lowe.

The other source that I can't not find at this particular moment goes into that a bit further and mentions about a later fiasco at a DTD Founders dinner. Basically the other three members were some how included in the founders roles but they did not know about that distinction. Instead they made it clear that they were members of Beta.

[sdbeta1]

Originally posted by Coramoor
I have read the history that Betarulz and Deltalum are talking about. I wish I had it on hand right this moment so I could quote it exactly.

One source I do have on hand is from a 1930's addition of The Beta Book. It mentions that 5 men initiated into Beta had been members of a local organization by the name of Delta Tau Delta. Of the five (J.D. Lowe, J.L.N. Hunt, William R. Cunningham, Thomas T. Holtan, and Benjamin S. Keene) two resigned so they could be counted as founders of DTD. Those two being Cunningham and Lowe.

The other source that I can't not find at this particular moment goes into that a bit further and mentions about a later fiasco at a DTD Founders dinner. Basically the other three members were some how included in the founders roles but they did not know about that distinction. Instead they made it clear that they were members of Beta.

John Hunt is considered a Delt founder. Hunt, Holtan, and Keene all appear on the rolls at Bethany.

[OleMissGlitter]

bump

[NutBrnHair]

One of Chi Omega's 5 founders was Dr. Charles Richardson, a Fayetteville, Arkansas dentist, a regent at the University, a Mason, and a proud member and National Officer of Kappa Sigma Fraternity.

[tunatartare]

I've always wondered if there is any connection between Kappa Alpha Theta and Kappa Kappa Gamma because they both have the letters alpha omega omicron on their badges.

[Tom Earp]

While a difference then there was a lot of interaction between GLOs back in The Old Days.

The idea was to aid and assist New GLOs when possible.

Many were New and needed guidence and got it.

While We are all proud of our Founding, it is amazing who helped.

My Local after We became LXA helped another Soroity Local get started and since went by the wayside!

Have times and hard feelings changed us that much?

[exlurker]

Originally Posted by KLPDaisy

I've always wondered if there is any connection between Kappa Alpha Theta and Kappa Kappa Gamma because they both have the letters alpha omega omicron on their badges.

In one of the ancient Greek systems for representing numbers, alpha omega omicron would represent 1870 -- the founding year that both Theta and Kappa share. See the discussion of the alphabetic numbering system at

http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac...k_numbers.html

Obviously, I have no way of knowing what meaning(s) are actually given to anything on the badge of either fraternity.

[UNLDelt]

Beta poster

I agree with my fellow Delt that sometimes as orgs grow the tall tales do as well. Here are a few items to consider:

Beta Theta Pi's Psi chapter was founded at Bethany in 1860. Delta Tau Delta was founded in 1858, two years earlier in response to the Phi Kappa Psi's Bethany Chapter being founded the same year and taking control of the Neotrophian Literary Society.

The story that appears on the Beta's Psi chapter website was written in 1927 (a clue to its accuracy) and contains many conflicting bits of information with what Delta Tau Delta has in very early documentation (earlier than 1927) and actual accounts by the founders documented at Karneas. The Psi chapter claims that in 1959 the Adelphian Literary Society divided into two groups one being a new fraternity in Delt, the other being a group of students that went to W & J to become Betas. But as you will see this claim is unsubstantiated.

As I mentioned above, Delta Tau Delta was formed when a corruption of the Neotrophian Society by Phi Kappa Psi occurred on campus in 1858 and the society's top honors were being awarded to only Phi Psi's and not based on merit. The secret society of Delta Tau Delta formed when our eight founders (we know eight to be true not 15, from early founding documents say who was present and even what assignment they had- badge, motto, ritual, constitution) met to discuss how to bring the Neotrophian Society back to a merit based and general student control. This first meeting took place in the spring of 1858 again, before Beta was even present on campus. This is when the Fraternity was roughly put together as it existed with only one primary goal in mind and there was no need for a grand system at that point. Once the first Delts successfully completed their initial task and ousted the Phi Kappa Psi chapter by beating them in competition the drive to continue the organization spread at which it was more formally organized in 1859. But due to the privilege of having founders who attended our early Karneas (general conventions), as well as early documents and rituals, we know the year it all began was 1858 and that's why we officially claim it as our founding year.

The Beta's Psi chapter document also claims that the motto of Delta Tau Delta was "Damn Those Delts" (somehow claiming it as referring to the Adelphian Society, or even the Phi Psi's somehow?) to which I laugh as does this not only doesn't make sense b/c it was the Neotrophian Society, not the Adelphian, but I can also assure you that this was not and is not the motto of our fraternity.

So I'm going to go a head and have to say that based on the conflict of information from the supposed Beta document (again, written in 1927, long after accurate accounts by multiple Delt founders themselves at Karneas long before 1927) that lays claim on being a part of Delt's founding I would have to disagree with Beta's claim of their involvment in the founding of Delta Tau Delta.

Just to add to the general topic. Monroe Marsh Sweetland, a member of Delta Tau Delta, was a founder of Delta Chi, originally a law fraternity founded at Cornell, he is actuall listed by them as a founder.

[PhoenixAzul]

Originally Posted by UNLDelt

Beta poster

I agree with my fellow Delt that sometimes as orgs grow the tall tales do as well. Here are a few items to consider:

Beta Theta Pi's Psi chapter was founded at Bethany in 1860. Delta Tau Delta was founded in 1858, two years earlier in response to the Phi Kappa Psi's Bethany Chapter being founded the same year and taking control of the Neotrophian Literary Society.

The story that appears on the Beta's Psi chapter website was written in 1927 (a clue to its accuracy) and contains many conflicting bits of information with what Delta Tau Delta has in very early documentation (earlier than 1927) and actual accounts by the founders documented at Karneas. The Psi chapter claims that in 1959 the Adelphian Literary Society divided into two groups one being a new fraternity in Delt, the other being a group of students that went to W & J to become Betas. But as you will see this claim is unsubstantiated.

As I mentioned above, Delta Tau Delta was formed when a corruption of the Neotrophian Society by Phi Kappa Psi occurred on campus in 1858 and the society's top honors were being awarded to only Phi Psi's and not based on merit. The secret society of Delta Tau Delta formed when our eight founders (we know eight to be true not 15, from early founding documents say who was present and even what assignment they had- badge, motto, ritual, constitution) met to discuss how to bring the Neotrophian Society back to a merit based and general student control. This first meeting took place in the spring of 1858 again, before Beta was even present on campus. This is when the Fraternity was roughly put together as it existed with only one primary goal in mind and there was no need for a grand system at that point. Once the first Delts successfully completed their initial task and ousted the Phi Kappa Psi chapter by beating them in competition the drive to continue the organization spread at which it was more formally organized in 1859. But due to the privilege of having founders who attended our early Karneas (general conventions), as well as early documents and rituals, we know the year it all began was 1858 and that's why we officially claim it as our founding year.

The Beta's Psi chapter document also claims that the motto of Delta Tau Delta was "Damn Those Delts" (somehow claiming it as referring to the Adelphian Society, or even the Phi Psi's somehow?) to which I laugh as does this not only doesn't make sense b/c it was the Neotrophian Society, not the Adelphian, but I can also assure you that this was not and is not the motto of our fraternity.

So I'm going to go a head and have to say that based on the conflict of information from the supposed Beta document (again, written in 1927, long after accurate accounts by multiple Delt founders themselves at Karneas long before 1927) that lays claim on being a part of Delt's founding I would have to disagree with Beta's claim of their involvment in the founding of Delta Tau Delta.

Just to add to the general topic. Monroe Marsh Sweetland, a member of Delta Tau Delta, was a founder of Delta Chi, originally a law fraternity founded at Cornell, he is actuall listed by them as a founder.

Hehe, good ol' Bethany (my bro and grandfather are Phi Tau chapter brothers there...neighbors to the Delts!). The founding stories are something that everyone who remotely knows a Bethany Greek gets to hear!

Incidentally, Beta Theta Pi re-colonized their Psi chapter at Bethany this year. http://www.psibeta.net/default.asp. Seems to be going pretty well for them .

[sigkappanda]

it could be just a rumor around my campus, but are Theta Chi and Sigma Kappa related at all? I know NHQ are both in Indianapolis, but that's about all the connection I know of - other than being told this was true by some Theta Chi brothers.

[Drolefille]

A ton of HQs are in Indianapolis. There's some sort of tax break there.

I don't know of any connection to Theta Chi, and I don't think they were on Colby's campus at the time.

ETA: i looked at Theta Chi's website and they only had an Alpha Chapter until 1902, by which point we had Alpha, Beta, and Gamma at Colby. Thei Alpha chapter was in Vermont and Beta was in Massachusetts.

So, it certainly doesn't seem likely and there's no mention of it in our history.