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  #1  
Old 11-18-2003, 03:22 PM
Rudey Rudey is offline
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Why do you exist?

I just want to throw this out there to you Greeks and see how you respond.

Why do you exist? What makes you different from other houses?

Saying what happens at the local level is the easy way out of this question.

-Rudey
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  #2  
Old 11-18-2003, 04:08 PM
sueali sueali is offline
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Nationally we exist because our founders were the only women who attended Colby College, in Maine. There were other women secret socities around at the time but they were not in Maine nor in the Northeast at all. This doesn't make us different because many other societies were formed for the same reason.
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  #3  
Old 11-18-2003, 05:47 PM
PhiPsiRuss PhiPsiRuss is offline
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Phi Kappa Psi: The Noble Fraternity

Phi Kappa Psi exists because of a life changing bond formed through a crisis.

In the Fall of 1850, there was a typhoid fever outbreak at Jefferson College in Canonsburgh, Pennsylvania. Many students left the campus due to the outbreak. Of those students who remained, about one fourth not only contracted this contagious disease, but died from it. Two freinds, William Henry Letterman an Charles Page Thomas Moore selflessly decided to remain on campus and help their fellow students back to health. Through all of the death and suffering that they witnessed on a daily basis, they formed a bond similar to that of soldiers at war.

They discussed their experience, and how it changed them. The idea of a fraternity dedicated to the "Great Joy of Serving Others" took time to form. They also decided that it would be a national fraternity. When they convened for their first meeting, on February 19, 1852, they formed the Pennsylvania Alpha Chapter of Phi Kappa Psi.

Phi Psi was the first fraternity founded that was neither a literary society, smoking club, nor in opposition to existing fraternal groups. The higher aims of Phi Psis founders earned this fraternity the nickname of "The Noble Fraternity" from other fraternities.

Phi Psi was also the first fraternity founded as a national fraternity.

Due to the life changing experiences of the Founders, trivial things that were once important ceased to be. Most fraternities had constitutional clauses that restricted membership to a highly specific denomination of Christianity. Phi Psi was nonsectarian, and the first fraternity to be so.

While many of Phi Psis early members would become Presbyterian Ministers, they were fraternity brothers with members of not only all denominations of Protestantism, but also with Catholics, Jews, Shintoists, and other religions. This was still in the 1850s.

Phi Psi even chartered at Columbia University with a majority Jewish group; a quarter of a century before the first Jewish fraternity was founded.

This early level of ethnic tolerance has continued to keep Phi Psi distinguished. In the early 1950s, the new swimming coach at Indiana University wanted to recruit top flight swimmers from California who happened to be Asian. He believed that the easiest way to assimilate these men into IU's student life was through fraternities. He called a meeting with his swimmers who were in fraternities. When asked if their fraternities would receive Asian members, only Phi Psi answered in the affirmative. Soon, Phi Psi dominated the IU swim team. In 1972, thanks to several brothers, especially Mark Spitz, if Phi Kappa Psi was an independent nation at the Olympics, we would have been third in Gold Medals.

Phi Psi was a leader of the interfraternity movement before it really existed. One of our brothers was a Chemistry Professor at the University of Pennsylvania, where we already had a successful chapter. Dr. Edgar Fahs Smith was also the editor of our national magazine, and subscribed to the magazines of many other national fraternities. One fraternity, Alpha Tau Omega, was experiencing difficulty expanding in the North due to prejudice against this Southern fraternity. In 1881, Dr. Smith recruited a group that successfully petitioned ATO. Out this group of Penn ATOs, several new chapters would be formed. This was in an era when a few other national fraternities were actively stealing chapters from others.

The lore of Phi Psi runs deep. Five of our brothers served in the U.S. Senate... at the same time, and while another Phi Psi was U.S. Attorney General and another was the President! The Father of the U.S. Airforce, Gen. Billy Mitchell was a Phi Psi. The founder of the CIA's predecessor organization, the OSS, Gen. William "Wild Bill" Donovan was a Phi Psi and the only American to receive this nation's 4 highest honors; the Congressional Medal of Honor, the Distinguished Cross, the Distinguished Service Medal and the National Security Medal. Gen. Donovan also received a Purple Heart. In fact, this 87 chapter national fraternity has a list of prominent alumni that easily rivals that of any fraternity of any size.

Phi Psi is also unique in that our board of directors, the Executive Council, has an undergraduate majority. Phi Psi's commitment to the development of undergraduate excellence does not end here. Phi Kappa Psi now has the third largest endowment of any fraternity, and the largest on a per chapter or per capita basis. At the current rate of growth, Phi Psi will have the largest in three years. Phi Psi also awards more scholarship dollars than any other national fraternity.

And one of the more recent developments, is the "Cabo Alpha Leadership Academy." This Phi Psi hotel and conference center is in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.

Signing off from New York City, where the billionaire mayor is a Phi Psi...

Last edited by PhiPsiRuss; 11-19-2003 at 09:43 PM.
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  #4  
Old 11-18-2003, 06:14 PM
Tom Earp Tom Earp is offline
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Each Greek Organization was Founded under certain Ideals and Precepts. Male or Female as they did just not get around to other parts of the country.

That is probably why there were so many Greek organizations today, other than at that time, communication was not as we know it today!

The main Beds of Fraternitys were at Union U. and Miami of Ohio.

They all professed certain Principles but as the years have progressed, the thinking has had to adjust to the times. Some have not. The Union Triad being one. That is why they do not have more Chapters.

There are many Famous Members of Greek Organizations who have distingushed themselves and never much heard about the ones who stayed in the trenches of life to take care of and fend for a Brother or even others!

That is one reason among many that We as Greeks Stand above others!
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  #5  
Old 11-19-2003, 11:15 AM
MysticCat MysticCat is offline
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Re: Why do you exist?

Quote:
Originally posted by Rudey
Why do you exist? What makes you different from other houses?
In a word: Music.

Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia is the largest fraternity -- and the only men's social fraternity -- bound by a bond of brotherhood that is founded on shared ideals, purposes and love of music.

That's why we exist and that's what makes us different from the others.
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  #6  
Old 11-19-2003, 11:27 AM
Kevin Kevin is offline
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Sigma Nu was originally founded to combat the hazing practices perpetrated by another group on the VMI campus.

At my chapter, I'd like to think we're similar in a lot of ways. Being a founding member, I'd never even considered going Greek until a friend of mine at work approached me about this interest group that was forming. I, like most believed basically everything I'd heard about fraternities at my campus (one of them had just nearly been kicked off of campus because one of their members (drunk) ran over a pledge who had passed out in the middle of a road (drunk) at one of their retreats. Maybe my suspicions about Greek Life weren't ill-founded.

3 years later, we received our charter. I'm still very proud whenever I attend meetings to hear the actives using our fraternity's principles as litmus tests for what we should or should not do or say.

Why do we exist? My fraternity gives a basis of principle and honor to our men in a world of moral relativism. It's hard to put it exactly into words but if ya'll had been able to attend our active chapter elections last night you would have heard some firey speaches about love honor and truth and what those virtues that we stand for mean to our members. I guess if you had to put it to words, that's why we exist.
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  #7  
Old 11-19-2003, 11:29 AM
PKTKKG PKTKKG is offline
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Our founders wanted something equal to the men's fraternities that existed on the Monmouth College campus. There was a literary society (I. C. Sorosis that became Pi Beta Phi in later years), but our founders decided that nothing short of a Greek Letter organization would satisfy them.

They founded the Kappa Kappa Gamma Fraternity (yes we are a Fraternity), and at the time thought they were the first to form a Greek Letter organization for women. The did not know it, but Kappa Alpha Theta had been founded using greek letters in January of 1870 before our founding date of October 13, 1870.

So we were the second ladies Fraternity founded using greek letters. In reading the history of Kappa, our founders never dreamed of more than a local existance for Kappa, but we have grown into one of the most recognized and respected women's fraternities.
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  #8  
Old 11-19-2003, 11:52 AM
sairose sairose is offline
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Straight from our website:

"In early spring of 1903, Mrs. Fredreka Howland, wife of William Howland, head of the Vocal Department of the University School of Music, Ann Arbor, Michigan, suggested that a musical sorority be organized which would aim for high standards of musicianship and for promotion of the highest type of music. She felt there was a need for such an organization. A meeting was held in Mr. Howland's studio to discuss this idea. There was some talk of a musical club but finally a Sorority was decided upon as better fitting plans for close bonds of friendship. It was decided that only students of fine character and special musical talent combined with excellent scholarship would be eligible for membership. On June 12, 1903, Sigma Alpha Iota Musical Sorority was founded. Following are the names of the founders, who were graduate students and faculty members: Elizabeth A. Campbell, Frances Caspari, Minnie M. Davis (Sherrill), Leila H. Farlin (Laughlin), Nora Crane Hunt, Georgina Potts and Mary Storrs (Andersen).

So, in short, what makes us different than other groups is that we're all bonded by one common love: music.
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  #9  
Old 11-19-2003, 05:32 PM
DeltAlum DeltAlum is offline
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To understand the history of Delta Tau Delta you must also understand the founding of greek letter societies. There are many similarities in the founding of the greek system in 1776 and the founding of Delta Tau Delta in 1858.
1776 Phi Beta Kappa, the first Greek letter society, is formed at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, in response to strict faculty members' attempts to rule all phases of students' lives. Nine men chronologically and geographically at the heart of impending revolution in the asyetunformed United States create for themselves an opportunity to secure freedom and the chance to govern their own affairs outside the classroom. Those nine students meet in the Raleigh Tavern on December 5 where they adopt a secret oath, a badge, a handshake, and mottoes in Greek and Latin. They devise an initiation ceremony and adopt a Greek letter name. The stage is now set for other Greek letter societies to follow suit.

You should recognize some of the same qualities in the story of Phi Beta Kappa's founding as those we at Delta Tau Delta embrace. The nine men who pledged their loyalty to each other in 1776 were also committed to excellence; they found strength in brotherhood, saw the importance of courage in the face of what they considered injustice. So you see, the quest for excellence extends deep into our roots, beyond even our own founding as a Fraternity, to the very beginning of the Greek system itself.

1858 Delta Tau Delta is founded at Bethany College. Eight undergraduates, angered by a fixed vote for a prize in oratory to be given at the Neotrophian Literary Society the only real forum for students to practice and demonstrate skills in poetry, public speaking, and writing essays respond by forming a secret society. The purpose of the new society, known only by the Greek letters Delta Tau Delta, is to see that the Neotrophian is returned to popular control, and delivered from the hands of the group of students who seized it.

The Fraternity was founded to right an unjust situation; Delta Tau Delta was born of the knowledge that integrity is essential. Its eight founders' outraged that one group of students would and could choose in advance the candidate they favored, then join together to swing enough votes for that man to win, regardless of his actual performance in the contest, presented the first opportunity for Delts to realize the importance of accountability.
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The above is the opinion of the poster which may or may not be based in known facts and does not necessarily reflect the views of Delta Tau Delta or Greek Chat -- but it might.

Last edited by DeltAlum; 11-19-2003 at 05:36 PM.
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