1913 February - To Dragma

To Dragma

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Alpha Omicron Pi Fraternity

3tabl? of (Entttptttfi

From the Grand President Dorothy Noble Safford 73
77
Concerning Secrecy Dorothy Noble Safford 78
80
The History of the University of Minnesota Antonia Marquis 28
84
Minnesota Traditions Bertha Marie Brechet 86
87
Literary and Honor Societies, Clubs, etc Henrietta Myrl Wheeler 92
94
The History of T a u Chapter Bertha Marie Brechet 98
106
Roll of Tau Active Chapter 110

Data on Pledging Margaret Henderson Dudley 114
115
Pledging and Scholarship Exchange 117
120
Dormitory Life as an Asset to a Chapter Mamie Hurt Baskerville 121
123
High School Fraternities John Calvin Hanna 124
125
The Situation at Barnard Newspaper clippings 127

The Development of the First Massachusetts Schools Leslie Harper 130
130
Woman's Day Activities: I31
131
The Pre-Panama Exposition at Stanford University Alice Shinn 132
133
Women's Day at the University of California Rose Gardner *34
14°
Barnard's Greek Games Margaret Kutner T5I
J54
The Rose and the Ring Unsigned XS4
X54
May Day at Randolph Macon {Catherine Gordon "5
*57
At the University of Minnesota.. Edith Goldsworthy

The Women's League at Northwestern Unsigned

The November Bazaar Helen C. Wooster

Pi Chapter Celebrates Founders' Day An Alumna

Editorials:

The Century Investigation

To "The-Might-Have-Beens" Dorothy Noble Safford

Banta's Greek Exchange Ira Henderson
The New Alumnae Editors
Business Management

Phi Beta Kappas in Alpha Omicron Pi

Active Chapter Letters

Alumnae Chapter Letters

News of the Alumnae

Births

Engagements

Weddings '• •

In Memoriam

Fraternity Expansion

DIRECTORY OF OFFICERS

F O U N D E R S O F A L P H A O M I C R O N PI

Jessie Wallace Hughan, Alpha, '98, 663 Quincy Street, Brooklyn, N . Y .
Helen St. Claire Mullan (Mrs. George V . ) , Alpha, '90, Andrew Avenue, Uni-

versity Heights, New York.
Stella Stern Perry (Mrs. George H . ) Alpha, '98, Overlook Avenue, Hacken-

sack Heights, N. J .
Elizabeth Heywood Wyman, Alpha, '98, 456 Broad Street, Bloomfield, N. J .

OFFICERS

EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.

Grand President, Dorothy Noble Saflord, 1306 Webster Street,
New Orleans, L a .

Grand Vice-president, Edith Augusta Dietz, 217 West 105th

Street, New York City.
Grand Recording Secretary, Anna Estelle Many, 1327 Henry Clay

Avenue, New Orleans, L a .
Grand Treasurer, Lillian Gertrude MacQuillin, 155 Angell Street,

Churchill House, Providence, R. I .
Grand Historian, Stella Stern Perry (Mrs. G. H.) Overlook Avenue, Hacken-

sack Heights, N. J .
Registrar, Gladys Courtian Britton (Mrs. John A. J r . ) , 425 Elwood Avenue,

Oakland, Cal.
Auditor, Ada Beatrice Donaldson, 1405 W. Church Street, Knoxville, Tenn.
Examining Officer, Meleta Skillen, 316 N . 3rd Street, Olean, N . Y .
Chairman Committee on New Chapters, Ruth Capen Farmer, (Mrs. Walter),

Washburn, Wis.
Editor-in-Chief of To D R A G M A , Virginia Judy Esterly (Mrs. Ward B.) 244

Alvarado Road, Berkeley, Calif.
Business Manager of T o D R A G M A , Isabelle Henderson, 2655 Wakefield Ave.,

East Oakland, Cal.

PAN-HELLENIC CONGRESS

Delegate, Mrs. Carrie Green Campbell, 715 Court St., Port Huron, Mich.
Mrs. J . H . Crann, A X 12, 610 Colorado St., Davenport, Iowa.

EDITORIAL BOARD OF TO DRAGMA

Editor-in-Chief, Virginia Judy Esterly (Mrs. Ward B . ) , 244 Alvarado Road,
Berkeley, Cal.

Business Manager, Isabelle Henderson, 2655 Wakefield Ave., Oakland, Cal.
Assistant Business Manager, Margaret Henderson Dudley, 245 Alvarado Rd.,

Berkeley, Cal.
Exchanges, Kate Brown Foster, 2717 Hillegass Ave., Berkeley, Cal.
Chapter Letters, Blanche Du Bois, San Leandro, Cal.

ALUMNAE ASSISTANT EDITORS N. Y.
Alpha—Josephine Pratt, 64 Mahlsleadt Place, New Rochelle,
Pi—Alice Ivy, 1556 Calhoun St., New Orleans L a .
Nu—Elinor Byrns, 27 Cedar St., New York City. N . Y .
Omicron—
Kappa, Iris Newton, Monroe, L a .

Zeta—Edna Spears, 630 North 6th St., Lincoln, Neb.
Sigma—Rose Gardner, 1429 Spruce St., Berkeley, Cal.

Theta—Lucy Allen, 11 Spring Ave., Greencastle, Ind.

Delta—Mrs. Maurice Keating, 244 Weston St., Waltham, Mass.
Gamma—Margaret June Kelley, Freedom, Maine.
Epsilon—

Rho—Mrs. Carolyn Piper Dorr, Berwyn, III.
Lambda—Alice Shinn, 638 Walsworth Ave., Oakland, Cal.

Iota—Lora Henion, Robinson, 111.
Tau—Margaret Scott, 1325 7th St., S. E . Minneapolis, Minn.

ALUMNAE ASSISTANT BUSINESS MANAGERS Ave.

Alpha—Emma Burchenal.
Pi—Mrs. Geo Purnell Whittington, Alexandria, L a .
Nu—Daisy Cans, 497 Halsey St., Brooklyn, N . Y .
Omicron—Roberta Williams, 406 St. Charles St., Chattanooga, Tenn.
Kappa—Frances Allen, 1012 Federal St., Lynchburg, V a .
Zeta—Helen Piper, 1731 D St., Lincoln, Neb.
Sigma—Blanche Ahlers, 1985 Oak St., San Francisco, Cal.
Theta—Mabel June Allen, 3311 Central Ave., Indianapolis.
Delta—Mrs. E . H . Wood, 114 Curtis St., Tufts College, Mass.
Gamma—Mary E l l a Chase, Tarrett School for Girls, 4707 Vincennes

Chicago, 111.
Epsilon—
Rho—Julia Norton, 727 Foster St., Evanston, 111.
Lambda—Helen Dickinson, 1646 N . Fair Oakes Ave., Pasadena, Cal.
Iota—Annetta Stephens Shute, 601 53rd St., Chicago, 111.
Tau—Myrtle Wheeler, 1328 Keston St., St. Paul.

CHAPTER ROLL
Alpha—Barnard College, Columbia University, New York.
P i — I I . Sophie Newcomb Memorial College, New Orleans, L a .
Nu—New York University, New York City.
Omicron—University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tenn.
Kappa—Randolph-Macon Woman's College, Lynchburg, Va.
Zeta—University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Neb.
Sigma—University of California, Berkeley, Cal.
Theta—DcPauw University, Greencastle, Ind.
Delta—Jackson College, Tufts College, Mass.
Gamma—University of Maine, Orono, Me.
Epsilon—Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y.
Rho—Northwestern University, Evanston, 111.
Lambda—Leland Stanford University, Palo Alto, Cal.
Iota—University of Illinois, Champaign, 111.
Tau—University of Minnesota.

New York Alumnae—New York City.
San Francisco Alumnae—San Francisco, Cal.

Providence Alumnae—Providence, R. I .
Boston Alumnae—Boston, Mass.
Los Angeles Alumnae—Los Angeles, Cal.
Lincoln Alumnae—Lincoln, Neb.

Chicago Alumnae—Chicago, 111.

CHAPTER SECRETARIES
Alpha—Esther Lois Burgess, 557 W. 124th St., N . Y . C.
Pi—Theodora Sumner, 7914 St. Charles Ave., New Orleans, L a .
Nu—

Omicron—Louise M. Wiley, 922 9th St., Knoxville, Tenn.
Kappa—Katherine Gordon, College Park, V a .
Zeta—Rose Krause, 1232 R St., Lincoln, Neb.

Sigma—Phillis Maguire, 2345 Channing Way, Berkeley, Cal.
Theta—Florence Hughes, A 0 I I House, Greencastle, Ind.
Delta—Leslie Hooper, 124 Professors Row, Tufts College, Mass.
Gamma—Rachel H . Winship, Mr. Vernon House, Orono, Me.
Epsilon—Ruby C. Madsen, Sage College, Ithaca, N. Y .
Rho—Arie Kenner, Willard Hall, Evanston, 111.
Lambda—Beatrice Freuler, Stanford University, Cal.
Iota—Mabel Claire Wallace, 210 E . John St., Champaign, 111.
Tau—Edith E . Goldsworthy, 421 6th St. S. E . Minneapolis, Minn.

ASSOCIATE EDITORS

ACTIVE CHAPTERS

Alpha—Maria Diaz de Villalvella, 536 W. 113 St., New York City, N. Y .
Pi—Margaret Foules, New Orleans, L a .
Nu—Alice Clark, 210 W. 21 St., New York City.
Omicron—Louise Wiley, Knoxville, Tcnn.
Kappa—Katherine Gordon, College Park, Virginia.
Zeta—Ruth Wheelock, 1232 R St., Lincoln, Neb.
Sigma—Mary DeWitt, 2345 Channing Way, Berkeley, C a l .
Theta—Florence Hughes, A 0 I I House, Greencastle, Ind.
Delta—Dorothy Bartlett, Tufts College, Mass.
Gamma—Louise Barflett, Mt. Vernon House, Orono, Me.
Epsilon—
Rho—Edith Meers, Willard Hall, Evanston, 111.
Lambda—Lois Walton, A 0 II House, Leland Stanford University, Cal.
Iota—Mabel Jackson, University of Illinois, Champaign, 111.
Tau

ALUMNAE CHAPTERS

PRESIDENTS

New York—Edith A. Dietz, 217 W. 105th St., New York City, N . Y .
San Francisco—Margaret Henderson Dudley (Mrs. C . de Witt), 245 Alvarado

Road, Berkeley, Cal.
Boston—Clara R. Russell, 23 Hancock St., Winchester, Mass.
Lincoln—Annie Jones, Lincoln, Neb.
Los Angeles—Grace A. McPherron, 1016 Orange St., Los Angeles, Cal.
Providence—Elsie McCausland, 1148 Manning St., Providence, R. I .
Chicago Alumnae—



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DOROTHY NOBLE SAFFORD

To D R A G M A

VOL. V I I I . FEBRUARY, 1913 No. 2.

To DRAGMA is published at 450-454 Ahnaip Street, Menasha, Wis., by George
Banta, official printer to the fraternity. Entered at the Postoffice at Menasha,
Wis., as second-class matter, April 13, 1909, under the act of March 3 , 1897.

To DRAGMA is published on the twenty-fifth of November, February, May
and July.

Subscription price, One Dollar per year payable in advance; Single copies
twenty-five cents.

Virginia Judy Esterly, Editor-in-Chief. Isabelle Henderson, Business
Manager.

FROM THE GRAND PRESIDENT

Among the many subscribers to To DRAGMA will there be any
I wonder, who will enjoy hearing of my visit in the middle West
last fall, as much as I enjoy telling of it. You have already re-
ceived the results of my inspection in the report sent to each chapter,
but in order to get the real benefit you should take the trip your-
self. Among the first things I learned were that there are other
fraternities besides Alpha O, and that the South has a formidable
rival in the West where hospitality is concerned.

I left New Orleans on the fourteenth of October, arriving in
Chicago on the fifteenth. Mrs. Bigelow met me and I stayed in
her charming home in Maywood until the next clay when I joined
Mrs. Campbell at the Congress Hotel. We stayed there during
the meeting of Presidents and the National Pan-Hellenic Confer-
ence. The former was most helpful, combining the meeting of
many interesting and forceful women with thoughtful discussions
of their work. The conference opened on Thursday afternoon
and of course we attended all sessions, Mrs. Campbell as our inter-
esting delegate and I as an interested observer. There were several
pleasant social gatherings, among which were the reception given
by the College Club of Chicago and the informal dinner at H u l l
House where the inexperienced delegates, editors, and inspectors
sat at the feet of the wise ones and absorbed knowledge. The
conference adjourned after the luncheon at the Patten Gymnasium
at Evanston where three hundred and ninety-six fraternity women
were present, of which Alpha O had a fair proportion.

TI- TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

Directly after the luncheon I went over to Willard H a l l to begin
my tour of inspection with the Rho girls. Fortunately they did not
seem to expect much in the way of age or wisdom but made me one
of themselves and carried me off to participate in a party given by
the Woman's League. On Sunday my dignity was revived by
service in one of the beautiful Evanston churches and by a long
walk on the lakeshore where the falling leaves made one long to
be a breeze, or a squirrel, or something else irresponsible enough
to enjoy them in the right way. On Monday there was a talk with
the Dean, Miss Blanchard, who seemed so interested in girls and
their problems that I was late to chapel! An incident connected
with appearance at chapel proved conclusively two things: that
Rho announces a pledge with red roses, and that I ' m older than I
seem. I shall not ask you to accompany me to the delightful lec-
tures and classes I attended everywhere, for doubtless you have
such experiences of your own. On Monday night I was initiated
into the mysteries of a truly college spread and when I felt that
the girls were sufficiently sustained to withstand the transformation
I became again the inspector. (See report!) Somewhere near
the hour of light-bell we attended the reception given Miss Col-
trane, President of Kappa Delta, by the local chapter.

On Tuesday I went to Greencastle and was met by Fern Thomp-
son of delightful convention memories, and Edna Harvey of the
active chapter. Now I cannot tell you about the charming girls
of Theta chapter, for they are indescribable, but I want you to
know Mrs. Doll, the house-mother, whom all acknowledge to be
the life of the home. I want you to see her just as she met me,
with outstretched hands and welcoming smile—with cheery, blazing
fires in the background. (How this Southerner did feel about those
arrogant radiators!) The home life of Theta chapter is beautiful—
the oldfashioned. hospitable house, the deference paid to Mrs. Doll,
her interest in "my girls," and the hearty spirit of good-will every-
where. I am going to tell you of only a few of the many delight-
f u l events of my stay in Greencastle. One, which entails a little
pleasant gossip I , being a woman, cannot omit. I went to dinner
with Dean Smith and Ruth Cane, one of our Thetas who lives in
Woman's Hall. Because you do not know my hostesses you cannot
appreciate just what I mean when I say that I had a delightful
afternoon but accept my word and then hear Miss Smith saying.
"When I visited Newcomb last winter I met a charming girl under
one of the great oaks, who offered to take me around the campus,
and she was so cordial that I wondered i f a De Pauw girl could

TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 75

ever be just that gracious to a stranger—she wore an Alpha O pin!"
("Pi chapter again!" you say. Yes, I am rather proud of it.) A
pleasant afternoon was spent in meeting ( I think) everyone in
Greencastle. Just picture my enjoyment, with Mrs. Doll ready
with names and interesting facts on one side and an enthusiastic
group of girls on the other, with the chapter house looking its
gayest, with pleasant guests saying pleasant things, and a great
bunch of white chrysanthemums sent by T r i Delta just opposite—
wasn't that the very essence of true Pan-Hellenic spirit, girls? I
am so sorry that I must omit the informal dinner, the chafing-dish
party, the drive through glorious autumn woods, and a few other
things, but my train leaves on Friday morning and I have promised
to spend the day with Blanche Babcock and visit Purdue University.

I spent Saturday in Chicago and in the afternoon went out to
Berwyn for the installation of the Chicago Alumnae. We were
hospitably met and entertained there by Carolyn Piper Dorr, that
tower of strength for Rho. Iota, Zeta, Pi, and Rho were represented
at the installation and reports since have confirmed what I felt then,
that our latest alumnae chapter is a splendid addition to the roll of
Alpha Omicron Pi. I was the guest of Mrs. Dorr until Sunday after-
noon when I again went to Maywood. Yes, the Bigelows were
the beginning, continuation, and ending of my whole trip and the
repository for mail and baggage in the meanwhile!

On Monday I met Mrs. Campbell in Chicago and we left for
Minneapolis. We stayed while there at the Radisson Hotel where
the installation of Tau chapter was held on Tuesday, the twenty-
ninth of October. Mrs. Mitchell, of Zeta, was there with Alpha
roses. Alpha Girls, and Alpha spirit too—could anyone ask for
more? Our first meeting was held at the home of Bertha Marie
Brechet, a charter member, and was an inspiring one. Perhaps I
am prejudiced by the fact that Tau chapter is "my own" but you
will consider mine a pardonable pride when you too find out that the
girls who waited so long and so patiently for Alpha O are worthy
of having all that our fraternity can bestow. We who have been
directly in touch with them realize and admire their executive ability,
their high ideals, and their charm, and to you we commend them
for all of love and loyalty which an Alpha O finds in herself to give.

While I was in Minneapolis nothing gave me more pleasure than
my meeting with Miss Bliss, a member of Kappa Kappa Gamma,
and president of the local Pan-Hellenic. I wish there were more
girls whose ideal of interfraternity relationship approached hers.
She was so interested in showing me the fraternity situation at

76 TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

Minnesota and so cordial in welcoming a band of fellow-Greeks
and helping them to find their place in the Pan-Hellenic world.
From a member of Gamma Phi Beta also I received a warm welcome,
and when I left, plans were being made by the Pan-Hellenic to
take Alpha O into its midst in a formal way. (And I understand
that the interfraternity spirit at Minnesota is bad!)

I reached Lincoln on Friday and again a familiar face greeted me
—Annabell Good with her merry smile. Now don't say that Zeta
is my favorite chapter because I imposed myself upon it for five
days, and don't say that I must have been a nervous wreck when I
left, for neither is true—I am diplomatic and 1 am healthy! But
what could I do in such surroundings? There were Viola Gray
and Helen Piper and Mattie Woodworth to whom I used to write
my undergraduate trials; there were three functions a day at least;
boxes from the florist's at odd hours; Mrs. Weiby, house-mother,
delightfully reminiscent of her girlhood days and always ready to
discuss the merits of "our girls;" and there was that absorbing active
chapter and its problems. So don't imagine for a moment that
I am telling you all, when I mention an afternoon with the Lincoln
Alumnae chapter, at dinner at Mrs. Hunter's, a luncheon at Maud
Pierce's, a dinner at Mrs. Fitzgerald's, and informal affairs with
Viola, Helen, Annie Jones, Edna Harpham and Edna Spears. Of
course there were the two formal occasions, the alumnae luncheon
and the active chapter's "at home," and also the good-fellowship of
some Chi Omega friends just around the corner, but this w i l l give
you no idea of the individual girls, of the busy, helpful lives of
the alumnae and of the gay enthusiasm of the active chapter.

On the seventh of November I was back in Minneapolis, osten-
sibly to introduce Tau chapter to its Greek world but really to see
those girls again. I attended an interesting Pan-Hellenic meeting
to which Dean Sweeney contributed some excellent plans and advice.
Then there was a large reception to which Alpha O invited repre-
sentatives from all the fraternities, members of the faculty, and
numerous outside friends. An informal gathering of the girls and
a theatre party marked the last day of my visit there and then I left
for Illinois.

I spent three short days with Iota chapter and how I did wish
they could have been six! One is so proud to be an Alpha O when
visiting in Champaign. The girls are so earnest and capable and
Mrs. Stowers is such a hostess. When you know her you realize
why the girls are such splendid Alphas. Here again I was fortu-
nate i n meeting a large number of the students at a Woman's League

TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 77

party, and later on, some girls of other fraternities called. One
afternoon the girls held their informal "at home" for the men of
the university, and I was interested to note what gracious and
unaffected hostesses our girls made.

When I left Champaign on the eleventh of November I expected
to reach New Orleans after a brief visit in Mississippi, but the
inducements held out by a classmate were too numerous to with-
stand, so my return home was very much delayed. My visit to Pi
chapter threatened to resolve itself into frequent trips down to
Newcomb with equally fragmentary results, but my official report
shows you that this is not the case and the chapter itself would be
very glad to prove to you that it.is as loyal and fine as of old with
the further addition of those qualities which it has been told many
other chapters possess. And I too should be happy to have you with
us and to show you that the many thoughtful acts of my many
considerate hostesses are remembered and appreciated.

DOROTHY NOBLE SAFFORD.

LET US ABOLISH SECRECY FROM OUR FRATERNITIES

Once upon a time a Woman conceived the idea of a beautiful
Garden and into the plans for it went her dearest hopes and her
loftiest ideals. She took into her confidence those friends who also
had hopes and ideals, and asked them to come and live in her
Garden and help make the dreams come true. Around the Garden
they built a Wall—that may not have been wise, I do not know,
but perhaps they felt that the Garden would be more truly theirs
if separated form the broad highway and the gaze of the careless
passer-by. Then in the Garden they planted small saplings that
would grow into noble trees; they established firmly sturdy shrubs
in the background ; they laid out winding paths that their tired
feet might find soft places after the hard stones of the city streets;
they bordered these paths with old-fashioned flowers that spoke elo-
quently of faith and hope, sincerity and truth; they tended care-
fully the modest violet, the fair lily, and the red rose of love. A l l
the flowers that they admired most grew there.

Gradually they began to absorb some of the beauty and sweet-
ness of the blossoms and their lives grew better and fairer. They
felt that there were others aiso who might love the flowers and so
they stood at the gate and watched the people passing by. One of
these seemed to say that she could feel the beauty of the Garden and
would tend the plants with care—they asked her to enter; one

78 TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

lingered and they thought she too might join their band, but some-
thing seemed to whisper that she would but pluck the blossoms and
let them wither; one they urged to come within the gate who pre-
ferred a garden farther on; one hurried by who was destined for
great deeds on the highway and had no time for pleasant hours in
a Garden; one passed with quiet tread and so busy were those at
the gate that they did not see her until she had gone; one came
tripping along and, because she seemed light-hearted and gay, they
fancied that she would suit their Garden life and took her in only
to find that she liked the bright colors but could not understand
the language of the flowers. And as they lived together in the
Garden they became thoughtless and let the weeds grow up and
the thorns crowd out the roses and the flowers wither from neglect.
Some were careless about those whom they asked to share the
Garden with them. Others forgot that there were Gardens as fair
as this one, and tried to keep the stranger from entering these.
Many were heedless of those on the highway and forgot that the
flowers might be carried out to those who had no Garden. But most
of them remembered that through their lives and actions the beauty
and the fragrance of their Garden might go to all the world. And
so one day the Woman said: "There are some who pass by our
gate and think that we should have no Garden because they have
none and there are some of us within who feel the same. Now we
made our Garden, we think it a beautiful Garden, we know that
we are better for living in it. I t is not large enough for everyone
to live in happily but why may not all see it and then have Gardens
of their own? When our plants were small and we were inex-
perienced we thought they needed the protection of a Wall, but i f
they cannot now withstand the winds and storms of the outer world,
surely they must be but weak seedlings in poor soil. I f all who
pass by might see our Garden and know that it is fair and realize
that the weeds grow and the flowers wither only when we are care-
less, then perhaps they might see why we love it so.

Let Us Tear Down The W a l l ! "

DOROTHV NOBLE SAFFORD.

HISTORY OF T H E UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA

To Colonel John W. North belongs the credit of starting the
movement which resulted in the establishment of the University
of Minnesota. He framed the act which was adopted by the legis-
lature February thirteenth, 1851, and which became the charter

TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 79

of the. University. The charter provided that the University should

be located "at or near the falls of St. Anthony."

I t was deemed expedient to erect a building at once, and a sub-
scription paper was circulated. Subsequently, the first building,
of two stories, known as the "Academy Building" was erected.
College was opened for the first time November twenty-sixth, 1851,
with an enrollment of about twenty. Before the end of the year
forty had been enrolled, but it was discontinued the following
summer and the regents hoped to open under more favorable condi-
tions in a new building. The rapid growth of population and the
agitation concerning the removal, caused the regents to purchase
a new site. Twenty-five acres of the present site, on the high east
bank of the Mississippi, in the city of Minneapolis, were bought
in 1854. A new building was begun, but because of hard times
and disagreement, it was not completed. For eleven years College
was carried on in the old building; while the new one, known as
the "Old Main," was gloomy and deserted, and was falling into
a state of dilapidation. Finally in 1867 the Legislature appropriated
$15,000, the first appropriation ever made for the University, to
repair the building. Until this date, the school had been supported
by donations from private individuals. I n 1869 a faculty of nine—
W. W. Folwell as president and eight professors, three of whom
had taught in the old college—was elected. I n September of that
year, the University was formally opened by the calling of the
first college classes. There were two colleges, the Academic Col-
lege and the College of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts. Young
women had been admitted before and were also admitted when the
University was organized. There were about two hundred and
thirty students. I n 1871 the faculty had increased to double its
original number. The first commencement took place in June 1873,
at wRich time there were but two graduates. A n agricultural build-
ing was erected and the main building enlarged. The members
kept increasing and f u l l college work was carried on. By 1880
the University had virtually passed out of its infancy and entered,
unchecked, upon a period of growth and prosperity. President
Folwell resigned in 1883 and Cyrus Northrop, of Yale, became the
new president in 1884. There was then an enrollment of three
hundred and ten. I n 1890 the number was one thousand and two;
in 1895, two thousand one hundred and seventy one; in 1900, it
had risen to three thousand two hundred and thirty-six; and in 1905
it was three thousand seven hundred and ninety. I n the year 1888-89
the departments of law and medicine were added, and from then on

80 TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

the University grew by leaps and bounds. The college of pharmacy
was introduced in 1892 ; dentistry, in 1893; and chemistry, in 1904.
This growth is almost without precedent in the history of any edu-
cational institution. Since then the school of mines, the college
of education, and the graduate school have been added. There is
a new University Hospital—Elliott Memorial Hospital—with a
school for nurses in connection. The Agricultural School build-
ings are not located on the campus. The college of Agriculture
offers work in every branch.

At the present time, the University campus covers an area of
about one hundred and twenty acres. Of the twenty-three build-
ings on the campus, eleven are used for the work of the College of
Science, Literature and the Arts.

The growth and expansion of the University in the past few
years has been marvelous and to Doctor Northrop belongs the praise
for the surpassing manner in which he met the development.

ANTONIA MARQUIS.

MINNESOTA TRADITIONS

When a freshman enters the University of Minnesota, he comes
in touch with many traditions, "Oh, yes, we do that every year!"
"No, that is never done, but there is no rule against i t . " greet him
on every side.

One of the first things that the freshman notices, is that no one
smokes on the campus. Men with pipes, cigars, or cigarettes in
their mouths, extinguish them on entering the University grounds.
This is because President Emeritus Northrop expressed the wish that
no smoking be done on the campus, and it is out of respect for this
old and honored man whom everybody loved that this custom is
still followed.

Shortly after college opens, the Y. M . C. A, gives a reception for
its new members. Then the Y. W. C. A. receives in honor of the
young women who have joined. After these two receptions have
been given, a point affair is held to enable the men and women to
become acquainted, which under ordinary circumstances, is rather
a hard matter in so large a university. About this time, too, the
Woman's League gives its reception for the girls. Now the strangers
are beginning to feel "at home" on the campus, and we see them
bowing to their new-made friends.

About the middle of October, dark rumors can be heard regarding
a certain event which is soon to come and which is to decide the

TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 8!

supremacy of the freshmen or the sophomores. This contest is the
annual "Cane Rush." I t takes place on a large open space of
ground, surrounded by four buildings. Great crowds gather to
watch the struggle. I f the sophomores win, they may make any laws
which they desire for the freshmen. Sometimes they decree that
only a certain style of cap be worn, sometimes freshmen men are
not allowed to be seen with a girl on the campus, sometimes the fresh-
men are not allowed to slow down to a walk on the campus, but must
go to their classes "on the run."

Next the Woman's League announces the fact that the "Sunlight
Dances" are to begin. These are dances given once a month on
Saturday afternoon in the University Armory. I t gives the young
men and young women a chance to get acquainted as the dances are
characterized by their informality and spirit of good fellowship.
The men come by special invitation, but all of the members of the
"Woman's League" who have paid their dues, attend.

One great and important event, looked forward to by the seniors
and talked about by all, is the President's Reception for the seniors.
Usually it takes place late in the spring, but last year, President
and Mrs. Vincent surprised everybody by issuing invitations for
February fourteenth. They are attempting to change it from a very
formal to a very informal affair, and last year went far toward
accomplishing the desired result.

I must not forget to tell you of the "Post-Exam Riot," which
takes place the day after the last examination of the first semester.
A l l of the students assemble on the campus and partake of a general
good time. They have a great bonfire, zig-zag about the campus and
up and down University Avenue, and do not go home until late into
the night.

The most formal affairs are the Junior Ball and the Senior
Promenade, two annual dances. Anyone may attend, without respect
to his class at the University, and all of the girls anxiously look
forward to receiving "bids."

One of the most exciting and interesting moments in the year is
that during which the result of the Phi Beta Kappa election is
being announced. On the day of the announcement the chapel is
crowded, and everyone listens eagerly to hear who are the lucky
recipients of that honor.

Sometime in April or in May. the "Gopher" appears upon the
campus. This is the annual publication of the University of
Minnesota. "Gopher Day" is a very exciting time. No one even
pretends to pay the slightest attention to lessons; everybody reads

82 TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

the "Gopher" to find out who was "slammed" and who escaped.
I t is the same, I think, in all universities.

At Minnesota, all freshmen and sophomore men are required
to take " D r i l l , " which is very trying for most of them. Every
Saturday afternoon one can see all of the men in the two classes,
dressed in their uniforms of blue, parading about the campus,
keeping time to the stirring melodies played by the band. In the
spring the "troops" go out into the open country and have a "Sham
Battle" with the boys of a neighboring school. Classes are excused
for the day, and most of the students "turn out" to see the fun, but
the most one ever can see is clouds of dust, and, at the end, a crowd
of very dirty, tired, hot young men, forlornly marching homeward.

Once in every four years, a very elaborate festival, known as the
May Fete, is given. Each committee strives to outdo the others in
elaboration of detail and interest of subject. Neither work nor
expense is spared. Everyone does his best to make the affair the
success which it always is. Parades, plays, dances—all kinds of
entertainment that heart could wish, can be found on the campus.

We find many traditions in connection with the Senior graduation.
There is, of course, "Cap and Gown Day," on which the seniors,
wearing the insignia of their position, march around the campus,
are addressed by the President in the chapel, and then attend the
"Spread" given in their honor by the juniors.

After examinations are over, there is the planting of the ivy,
the reading of the "Class Poem," the "Class Prophecy," and the
"Class History," on Senior Class Day. Another custom which
everyone thoroughly enjoys is the throwing of old school books into
the river. The entire class gathers on the river banks to watch this
performance. After this ceremonial the seniors have their last spread
at Shevlin Hall.

Soon after, it may be next day, comes "Commencement," and,
with that, ends the university year.

BERTHA MARIE BRECHET.

LITERARY AND HONOR SOCIETIES, CLUBS AND OTHER
ORGANIZATIONS

The University of Minnesota is composed of students represent-
ing every class of society from the humblest to the highest. Repre-
sentatives from nearly all the nations are to be found in this varied
group and naturally they have sought each other's acquaintance
in order to promote the feeling of good fellowship. The outcome



kin i

I •

i f

I

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-

1
•

TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 83

of this friendship has been the organization of the Cosmopolitan;
Club. This club consists of individuals from the various nations
who meet once a month to discuss the current events of the world,
each one speaking in behalf of his own country. After the business
meeting some form of entertainment is enjoyed.

Beside the Cosmopolitan Club, several of the foreign countries
have organized clubs of their own. These are the French Club,
the Spanish Club, the Verein Gemuethlichkeit, the Greek Club, and
the Scandinavian Club.

The purpose of these clubs is to unite the efforts of those inter-
ested in the subject, in the attempt to further knowledge of the
language, customs, and character of the people of the different
countries, and to come together for mutual help and enjoyment.

There are at Minnesota many clubs whose purpose is merely
social, although the members are chosen from those students who are
pursuing the same course of study. These clubs are the Brush and
Pencil, members being from the art department, the Brace and Bit,
the name signifying the purpose, the Quill Club, consisting of those
individuals who are drawn toward the "Quill," the Trailers, a club
of walking enthusiasts, the Riding Club for the riding enthusiasts
and the Rifle Club for those interested in the game.

Some of the clubs on the campus, are of such a nature that their
exclusiveness, one might say, lends a sense of mystery which pre-
vents an outsider from ascertaining their real purpose, although it is
purely one of good fellowship, we are told. These clubs bear the
weird titles of "Kawa," "Tau Shonka," "Mitre," and the more
friendly, because better known "Tillikum" club.

The Knights of Columbus have a branch at the University. The
senior girls have a sorority called Sigma Tau. The Agricultural
• students belong to the all-inclusive Agricultural Club, as do the
Foresters belong to the Foresters Club. One must not overlook
the dignified organization known as the "Red Headed Club" whose
membership consists entirely of "light-headed" individuals.

Another class of similar bodies with a different purpose, are the
Masquers, the University Dramatic Club, the Glee and Mandolin
Clubs, the orchestra and band. The "Masquers" give two creditable
performances a year at one of the down-town theaters. The plays
are chosen with the idea of giving the people those plays which
are rarely put on by the road companies. One Shakespeare play is
given each year, while the other play is chosen from works of Ibsen,
Goldsmith, Bernard Shaw, or Pinero, for example.

The university Glee Club consists of about twenty members. The

.si TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

Glee and Mandolin Clubs make an annual tour of the state, in
concert, during vacations.

Having given an outline of the clubs of the university, we will
dwell for a moment on the Literary societies which are of vast
importance to all the students as they offer the opportunity to de-
velop the latent literary talents of the individual. The literary
societies are the "Athenian," "Philomathean," "Minerva," "Acan-
thus," "Theta Epsilon" and "Thalean." The work is conducted
much in the same manner of all literary societies, topics being
assigned, papers written, debates prepared, and dramatic works dis-
cussed. Students are elected by vote and their acceptance is optional.

In order to reward students who have done exceptional work
along literary or scientific lines, a few, each year, are elected to
Phi Beta Kappa. Election is based upon high scholarship and
character; this is also true of Sigma X i , an honorary scientific
society, whose members are elected from the scientific agid technical
departments. Another honor society for men who have represented
Minnesota in intercollegiate forensic contests is Delta Sigma Rho.
Others are the "Grey Friars," a senior honor organization, "Scabbard
and Blade," a branch of the national military organization, consisting
of the officers of the University corps of cadets, and Mu Phi Delta,
an honorary musical organization.

The outline of literary societies, clubs, and honor societies, is
brief but it is given with the hope that you may at least have a
glimpse of the many and varied organizations of Minnesota.

HENRIETTA MYRL WHEELER, TAU, '12.

HISTORY O F T A U C H A P T E R O F A L P H A OMICRON PI

In the winter of the year 1908, a group of four or five girls, one
of whom was myself, originated the Pi Phi Club. At first, these girls
were a part of no regular organization, but were bound together
only by close ties of friendship. The suggestion, by one of us, that
we form a club was most heartily welcomed by the rest. So we
drew up a constitution and organized ourselves into the Pi Phi Club.
The real purpose of the club was to unite its members in a close
bond of friendship, and in this it was successful.

In the school year of 1909 and 1910, the membership of the
organization was increased to ten. Some of the original members
had left the university, and others had been taken in, but all were
very congenial. Meetings were held every Saturday afternoon at the
homes of the different members, to which each girl would bring

TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 85

her work. During the year different social affairs were given, re-
ceptions, teas, and dances. The club was a great success, but no
one thought of making it anything more than a local organization
until a member of Alpha Omicron Pi sorority, who was attending
the university at that time, proposed that we petition the sorority
to which she belonged, for a national charter. We thought over
the proposition for a long time; we considered it in all its bearings;
and finally, we decided to petition Alpha Omicron Pi. We had
looked up the standing of the sorority and found that it was very
strong nationally; our Dean of Women, Miss Ada Comstock, recom-
mended it highly, so we felt that a charter, granted by that organ-
ization would be well worth any work we might have to do to obtain
it.

So we petitioned; obtained recommendations from our instructors;
and went to the Dean of Women and to the President of the univer-
sity for permission to form a new sorority on the campus. Every-
where we were met with a spirit of friendliness and with a desire
to help.

The school year of 1 9 1 0 and 1 9 1 1 passed rather uneventfully
as far as our charter was concerned. At long intervals we received
letters, some seemingly encouraging, others very discouraging. Many
times we felt like giving up. But of course, as long as we intended
to continue with the club in any case, we took in new members.
Socially, we were very active that winter. We gave numerous
parties and picnics, and one formal dance.

School opened in the year of 1 9 1 1 much the same as usual, and
society also showed little change. Social affair followed social
affair. Some of our new girls were continually being rushed by
different sororities, but we managed to keep them from leaving us,
although only the older members knew that the petition had been
sent to Alpha Omicron Pi.

Finally, toward the spring of the year, we received a letter say-
ing that some one would come to Minnesota to inspect our club.
Miss Mae Barlow was the one to visit us and we enjoyed her com-
pany very much. On leaving, she promised to try to have the
Grand Council take up the matter of the charter at the first meeting,
so that rushing could begin here during the summer months. We
were told that the Grand Council was to meet on the twentieth
of June, and so anxiously awaited the announcement as to what was
to be our fate. But no news came during the entire summer.

And then, shortly after school opened in 1912, we heard that the
charter had been granted. We were installed by Mrs. Campbell

86 TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

and Miss Dorothy Safford, on the twenty-ninth of October, 1912,
at the Radisson Hotel, in Minneapolis.

Tau chapter, since its installation, has been making rapid progress.
The girls have taken rooms and are well situated. They have one
new pledge, and are rushing other girls. Several social affairs
have been planned for the future. But best of all, the girls are
bound together by closer ties of friendship and sisterhood than would
have been possible outside of the sorority and they have gained new
sisters over all of the United States.

BERTHA MARIE BRECHET.

ROLL OF TAU ACTIVE CHAPTER

Zora Robinson, 717 14th Ave., S. E. Minneapolis, Minn.
Lillian Glessner, 904 20th Ave., N . Minneapolis, Minn.
Elizabeth Raymond, 225 Harvard St., S. E. Minneapolis, Minn.
Ruth Bulen, 904 University Ave., S. E. Minneapolis, Minn.
Gertrude Swanson, 1901 Chicago Ave., S. E. Minneapolis, Minn.
Stedy Swanson, 1901 Chicago Ave., S. Minneapolis, Minn.
Cassie Spencer, 526 1 1th Ave., S. E. Minneapolis. Minn.
Martha Wolff, 60 E. George St., St. Paul, Minn.
Ruth Buckly, 2541 15th Ave., S. Minneapolis, Minn.
Margaret Scott, 1325 7th St., S. E. Minneapolis, Minn.
Edith Goldsworthy, 421 6th St., S. E. Minneapolis, Minn.
Cecilia Moriarity, 578 Winslow Ave., St. Paul, Minn.

TAU'S ALUMNAE ARE

Irene Buckley, '11. '12.
Bertha Marie Brechet,
Beatrice Worthey, '12.
Merle Wheeler, '12.
Antonia Marquis, '12.
Carol Brown, '12.
Laura Hartman, '12.
Ruth Paene, '13.

TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 87

DATA ON PLEDGING

(COMPILED B Y MARGARET HENDERSON DUDLEY FROM CHAPTER LETTERS

OP T H E G R E E K P R E S S )

MATRICULATION PLEDGING

Iowa State University, Iowa City, Iowa.
Pledge day, matriculation day. Rushing four days.

Indiana State University.
Three days rushing as soon as college opens, then pledging.

Southwestern University, Texas, Georgetown.
Vanderbilt University. Nashville, Tenn.
Washington University, St. Louis, Mo.

No rule for pledging except that it could not be before the first
day of college—consequently summer rushing.
University of Missouri.
University of California.

FIRST SEMESTER PLEDGING

Albion College, Albion, Mich.
No rushing until first week before Thanksgiving.

University of Southern California, Los Angeles, Cal.
October 7, pledge day.

University of Colorado.
Pledge day, day before Thanksgiving.

A del phi College, Brooklyn, N. Y.
Pledge day, December 16.

Adrian College, Adrian Mick.
Pledge day was December 20, with rushing right along.

Allegheny College, Meadville, Pa.
Non-rushing season with pledge day December 7. ( I n men's
fraternities no man may be bid until his sophomore year.)

University of Montana.
No rushing. Pledge day three weeks after registration.

Boston University, Boston, Mass.
Pledge day December 18. Initiation during first week in January.

Newcomb College, New Orleans, La.
Pledging third day after matriculation.

University of Minnesota.
Six weeks rushing. Pledge day September 21. Six weeks' probation
of pledges. Sophomore pledge day next year.

Ohio University, Athens, Ohio.
About two weeks rushing.

88 TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA 0M1CR0X PI

FIRST SEMESTER PLEDGING

Buchtel College, Akron, Ohio. Only two parties allowed during
Pledge day, November 26. 111.
rushing season.

Illinois IVesleyan, Bloomington,

Pledge day, October 14.
University of Missouri.

Pledging allowed but no initiation until pledges have 24 hours
credit, except that the committee on student activities may at its
discretion waive this rule in the case of a student who has made
15 hours credit in his or her first semester in the university.
Franklin College. Franklin. Indiana.

Pledge day. any time after matriculation. D. C.
University of Toronto, Canada.

Nine weeks rushing.
George Washington University, Washington.
Bucknell University.

No rushing. Bid day late.
Hillsdale College, Michigan.

After trying for the last two years a second semester bidding day,
both sororities have concluded that the earlier bidding is more
satisfactory, so they went back to the old custom of issuing bids
on second Saturday in November.
University of Denver. Colorado.
Two weeks rushing.
State College of Washington. Pullman. Wash.
Three weeks rushing. No initiation until completion of 15 hours
satisfactory work. Initiation after New Years.
University of Kansas.
Ten days rushing. September 28, pledge day. Pledges cannot
be initiated until credited with 10 hours work.
Colby College.
Pledge day, October 14.
Jackson College, Boston. (Tufts)
Pledge day, November 19. No open rushing except two parties
allowed to each fraternity.
University of South Dakota.
Two weeks rushing following registration. Pledge day, October 20.
Large parties limited to three; one formal, two informal.
University of Wyoming.
November 14, pledge day.

TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 89

Stanford University, California.

Four weeks rushing.
University of Oklahoma.

Two weeks rushing.
University of Oregon.

One week rushing before pledging.
University of Washington, Seattle, Wash.

Two weeks rushing. Only dinner dates allowed except on Friday
and Saturday.
State College for Women. Tallahassee, Fla.

•Pledge day, middle of December.
University of Missouri.

Two weeks rushing before pledging, but no initiation until fresh-
men have 15 credits.
Corn ell University.
Rushing six weeks. Pledge day December 4.
University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tenn.
Pledge day, first of December.
Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

Six weeks practically open rushing with few rules. Pledge day.

November 4.

Swarthmore College, Pa.
Rushing three weeks. Pledge day December 7. Not allowed to
spend money on freshmen off the campus.

Iowa State College, Ames, Iowa.
Six weeks rushing. October 12, pledge day.

Iowa Wesleyan, Iowa.
Pledge day October 16; fifth Wednesday after college opened.

Lombard College, Galesburg, III.
Three weeks rushing. September 26, pledge day.

Bethany College, Bethany. IF. Va.
Six weeks rushing.

University of West Virginia, Morgantown, W. Va.
Four weeks rushing. (First week no rushing, pledge week no
rushing, leaving only two.)

University of Illinois, Champaign, III.
Two weeks rushing. September 28, pledge day.

University of Michigan.
One and one-half weeks rushing.

*Would this be called second semester?

90 TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

SECOND SEMESTER PLEDGING

Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio.

No rushing during first semester other than calling; February
7 to 17 unlimited rushing.
Coe College, Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
•Pledge day, last of first semester.
University of Colorado, Boulder, Colo.
Pledge day, December 19. No rushing except calls. Each sorority
has two rushing functions.
Judson College, Marian, Ala.
Pledge day in February. Must have 9 hours college work, must
pass all her mid-years.
University of Nebraska.
Wesleyan College, Macon, Ga.
Must have at least 12 hours literary work.
Butler, Indiana.
February 15, pledge day.
University of Pennsylvania.
Pledge day, first Friday in the second term of freshman year.
University of Vermont.
Pledge day, second Monday after mid-years. No rushing.
Baker University, Bald-win, Kansas.
fPledge day, May 25.
Cincinnati University, Cincinnati, Ohio.

SOPHOMORE PLEDGING

Wooster University, Ohio.
Knox College, Illinois.

No rushing.
University of North Dakota.
Randolph Macon.

(Evidently rushing goes on for sophomores.)
Simpson College, Indianola, Iowa.

No rushing.
University of Montana.

Pledge day for sophomores, June 4.
Texas State University.

To introduce sophomore pledging next year.
De Paint) University, Indiana.
Ward Seminary.

Freshmen to he rushed after Christmas.

•Would you call this second semester?

tWould this be sophomore pledging?

TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 91

Baker University, Baldwin, Kansas.
* Pledge day May 25.

Barnard.
Pledging for sophomores first Monday in November.

Syracuse University, Syracuse.
Sophomore pledging next year.

Gaucher College, Baltimore. Md.
Northwestern University.

Pledge day for upperclassmen on matriculation day.
(/niversity of Minnesota.

Sophomore pledging next year.
University of Wisconsin.

ANNOUNCEMENT OF COLLEGE STANDING OF A L L ORGANIZATIONS

Swarthmore College, Pa.
Wittenberg College, Springfield, Ohio.
Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio.
University of Nebraska.
Franklin College, Franklin, Indiana.

No RULES FOR RUSHING OR PLEDGING

Texas State University.

EARLY PLEDGING, LATE INITIATION

University of Missouri.
Two weeks rushing before pledging, but no initiation until fresh-
men have 15 credits.

University of Kansas.
Ten days rushing. Pledge day September 28. Pledges cannot be
initiated until credited with 10 hours work.

James Millikin University, Decatur, III.
Four weeks rushing. Pledge day, October 5. Initiation of fresh-
men at end of first semester.

University of Missouri.
24 hours credit before initiation ; exceptions to some who have
15 hours.

State College of Washington, Pullman, Wash.
Three weeks rushing. No initiation until 15 hours work satisfactory.
Initiation after mid-years.

* Would this be second semester?

92 TO PRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI

PLEDGING ALLOWED B U T PLEDGES O N PROBATION :

24 HOURS CREDIT

Copied from The Kappa Alpha Theta
The Board of Curators of the University of Missouri at the June
1 9 1 2 meeting amended the rule concerning fraternity initiates to
read as follows:

No student having less than twenty-four hours credit toward
graduation shall be permitted to become a member of any fra-
ternity or sorority or live in any fraternity or sorority house;
except that the committee on student activities may, at its dis-
cretion, waive this rule in the case of any student who has made
fifteen hours credit in his or her first semester in the university.
At the same time the Board of Curators passed these resolutions :
" 1 . That as regards the question of admitting new students
under the fifteen hours regulation, the committee on student
activities shall especially favor fraternities having a creditable
standing for scholarship.

" 2 . That the fraternities should be made to understand that the
next year, or not later than two years hence, the right of any
fraternity to initiate members will probably be made to depend
upon its scholastic record."

PLEDGING AND SCHOLARSHIP

Copied from Chapter Letters of Contemporary Magazines

BUTLER, INDIANA

The three women's fraternities have once more agreed upon a contract
concerning pledging. The chief points in this contract are as follows:

Saturday, February 15, 1913, shall be pledge day.
Thursday, February 6, Friday 7, and Saturday 8, were drawn by K A 6 ,
I I B $ and K, K T respectively, upon which dates no other fraternity saving
the one having drawn the date shall be permitted to have parties.
Spikes shall be sent by A. D. T . messenger boys so as to reach their desti-
nation by two o'clock, February 15.
Two parties a month are allowed each sorority, making six during fall term
and three during the winter term.

ALBION, MICHIGAN

A new system of bidding was instituted this year. Af the Pan-Hellenic
Ball each girl was presented with an envelope containing a card upon
which she was to express her first and second preferences concerning fra-
ternities. These were sent to a disinterested person, a wife of one of the
faculty, who also received all the bids. After comparing the cards with

TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 93

the bids, the latter were formally sent out. This system did away with all
unnecessary excitement and seemed an excellent plan.

OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY

I n view to raising the scholarship among the women's fraternities Pan-
Hellenic decided that on pledge day, February 17, no invitation should be
sent to any freshman unless that freshman has passed the first semester's work.

S WART H MORE C O L L E G E

This year the invitations from all women's fraternities to freshmen were
sent by the Pan-Hellenic association and answers were also sent to the chap-
ters through this association. It was an experiment which we consider a
success since it made pledge day less conspicuous to non-fraternity people
and held a certain dignity which in the past has sometimes been lost.

WOOSTER UNIVERSITY

The Pan-Hellenic is discussing a new system of pledging, as follows: Each
fraternity is to hand to some disinterested person a list of the girls whom
it wishes to invite. Each girl, on being notified by this person that she is
invited to join a fraternity, responds by handing in her list of preferences.
I f the girl has been chosen by her first preference she is given an invitation
from this fraternity; if not, she receives an invitation from her second, third,
fourth choice, as the case happens to be. We are eager to try this plan here.

NOVEMBER 30, 1912

"The fraternities at Iowa have the same earnest tone as the rest of the
student body. President Bowman is authority for a statement that the fra-
ternities contain the greater part of the best students in college and that the
fraternity body, on an average, is superior in scholarship to the non-frater-
nity body. Most of the chapter houses have strict rules against the making
of noise except in certain specified hours; of their own volition they adopted
rules that no conditioned student should be pledge. Most of them have a
custom of sending upperclassmen to the dean's office once a week to look
up the records of the younger members. Those who have fallen behind in
their work are then promptly forced to buckle down to their books. A similar
custom is in vogue at Michigan and Wisconsin." —Quoted by Scroll from
Chicago Record-Herald.

TAU

UNIVERSITY OF MISSISSIPPI

Tau chapter of Chi Omega was established in 1899, absorbing Sigma T a u , a
local started in 1895. There were eleven charter members and these were
added to, until T a u has about eighty girls.

Quite a number of years ago a fight against the fraternities at the Uni-
versity of Mississippi was begun by a few non-fraternity men, but this
gradually died down and was forgotten. Then in 1910, a bill to abolish fra-
ternities in the university was brought up by Mr. Lee M . Russell, a non-
fraternity man of Oxford. This fight ended with a victory for the fraternity
people by a very close margin—losing in the House of Representatives and
winning by one vote in the Senate. We regained confidence and the fra-
ternities took on new life, as it was thought all trouble was over.

When, however we came back to college in the fall of 1910, we felt immedi-
ately that the fight was again on and a long secret session of the Board of

94 TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

Trustees convinced us, so when we were called together and the president of the
Board announced that fraternities had been abolished, we were not surprised.
We were told they were to be allowed to die down, no new members being
initiated and all charters handed in by June, 1913.

The fraternity people immediately became dissatisfied and another long
fight began. The Legislature again took it up, the same Mr. Russell intro-
ducing the bill to the effect that no person who belonged to a fraternity could
win medal, honor or diploma in the university. This seemed so absurd, that
no one thought of it passing but it did and by an overwhelming majority.
This seems so strenuous that since its passage men have been working harder
than ever, for this means that many brilliant students will not even be allowed
diplomas. Now they have taken the matter to the courts and at an early
date it will be tested, some of the ablest lawyers in the South representing the
fraternities.

As far as T a u chapter is concerned the legislative purpose is already accom-
plished, for we have not a girl in the university this year. We have not been
allowed to initiate in two years and our last two girls were graduated in June.
I f , however, we were to win, the revival of our chapter would not be hard as
we have several younger sisters in the university, and know others who would
come with such an inducement. We hope within the next few months to know
what our ultimate fate will be, as the suspense keeps us so undecided as to
what to do.

We can't make up our minds however to give up, as we can't think of
Tau chapter as dead and possibly see another chapter under the name of T a u ,
and we hope soon to prove that T a u is alive.

E L G E N I A L E F T W I C H , F.leusis, of Chi Omega.

DORMITORY LIFE AS AN ASSET TO A CHAPTER

In the enthusiasm of fraternity pride, most of us long for, strive
for and usually obtain a fraternity house as the height of our am-
bition. Let us stop and think a bit. Life in \ fraternity house is
pleasant, and has many advantages, such as furnishing a real home
while at college, a place where we may exercise our domestic bent, a
place where we are surrounded by only congenial friends. I n our
eagerness for fraternity, though, don't you think we overlook the
other side of the question—the real advantages of dormitory life.
Of course what I have to say applies only to such places as have
adequate dormitory facilities, and is based largely on my own college
experiences at Randolph-Macon where we live in the dormitories
and have a club house of only four rooms for fraternity purposes.

It is a basic fact that what is good for the individual member of
the fraternity is indirectly good for the fraternity. Now it seems
to me that dormitory life is really good for a girl because it is demo-
cratic. The average college girl comes from a home where her
associates are largely fixed by the social position of the family.

TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 95

Therefore she needs a change, she needs to live among many girls,
because she needs to develop her self-reliance. Dormitory life gives
her the opportunity to develop her power of judging character; of
choosing her associates, guided by what they are rather than what
they are said to be. Left absolutely to her own ideas, a fresh-
man probably will make some mistakes in choosing her friends;
but time, much assisted by fraternity example and influence, w i l l
correct this, and the girl will soon find her right place. This
democratic feature of college life is more emphasized in dormi-
tories than in fraternity houses because the fraternity stands in the
stead of a member's family, and has a tendency to fix her associates.

Dormitory life is broadening. Living there a girl knows girls that
she would never know otherwise, girls whom she would never meet
except in class-rooms. These girls would drop into her room in
a dormitory, yet would never feel free to drop into a fraternity
house to see her. I n the dormitory, she takes part in little affairs,
little neighborhood, little corridor gatherings that she would never
even know about were she not living in the hall. A girl gets closer
to the non-fraternity girls, closer to the members of other fraternities
when she lives with them than when she lives apart and has to make
a distinct effort to see them; whereas fraternity ties are so strong
that dormitory life will not be injurious to the fraternity spirit
because members seek each other's society in spite of difficulties.
Surely we don't want to leave college numbering only our fra-
ternity mates among our good friends. Besides the great advantage
of knowing other girls, a girl is better known; and hence, when
deserving of honors, they are awarded to her.

Again the college spirit pervades the dormitory more than it can
the fraternity house or boarding house; hence a resident of a dorm-
itory is more imbued with it and is inspired to do more for her
college as a college. Most colleges nowadays have student govern-
ment, which amounts to a republic on a small scale with all of its
departments. The training it gives both to the student officers and
the students living under that regime is excellent, and most fitting
as a preparation for life after college, for it teaches self-government,
and gives opportunity to develop executive ability. This feature
of college life is largely eliminated when a girl lives out of a dorm-
itory for it is in the "college home l i f e " that it is most applicable.

All of this is gained without really losing any of the pleasure or
value of the fraternity. As stated in the beginning, let the fra-
ternity have a club house with three or four rooms, a place to meet,

9 6 TO PRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICROX PI

a place to go and enjoy life with her fraternity mates, a cozy,
comfortable place to rest. Here she can see as much of her frater-
nity sisters as she chooses, here she can have parties and learn to
entertain, and here she can exercise her domestic bent. Dormitory life
thus gives democracy, it gives a broader field for friendship and
a wider knowledge of character, it encourages college spirit, it
affords opportunity for training in self-government and exercise
of executive ability without in any way taking away the advantages
of the fraternity. Hence I say dormitory life is good for*the indi-
vidual girl and consequently indirectly good for the fraternity.

More than that, I think dormitories are directly good for a fra-
ternity. One thing is sure, we cannot get good material unless we
find it. The best way on earth to know a girl is to live with her or
near her. A chapter that has members scattered about in the dormi-
tories has a much greater opportunity to find good material than were
they grouped in a house to themselves.

Our best members are usually those who, before they joined the
fraternity, were friends of one or more of our members, and have
shown where dormitory life encourages friendship between fra-
ternity and non-fraternity girls.

Again, the good a fraternity does rebounds to improve the fra-
ternity. Now the field for fraternity influence is in direct propor-
tion to the number of people its members come in contact with.
Our girls know more people in dormitories than they would elsewhere,
hence dormitory life gives wider field for influence and greater oppor-
tunity to practice our high ideals, to inspire other girls, and to do
what we can to better conditions.

Then too, dormitory life gives an opportunity to eliminate that
abominable practice of mad rushing, the real root of most fraternity
evils and criticisms. Rushing as commonly practiced and as indicated
by the term itself is beneath the dignity of a fraternity, and it seems
to me does no real good. Does a girl accept us because we rush
her; that is, dine her, fete her, take up her every spare minute, or
because she knows us, admires us, and thinks we stand for some-
thing worth while? Do we want a girl who would accept our
invitation just because we entertain her, or do we want the girl
who goes deeper and lopks for our real worth? The answer is not
in doubt, yet think of the time and money we spend entertaining
and how little opportunity we have of really knowing the girl or
of her knowing us. When we invite a girl to a rushing party, she
cannot be natural, she is bound to feel self-conscious and she does
not show her real self. Yet, you say, we must be with her, we must

TO PRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICROX PI 97

see her, and how are we to do that unless we invite her to the fra-
ternity house—that is to the girl rushing. Just here the dormitory
comes in. Here we can drop in her room informally; she feels
free to reciprocate. We can see her in the halls, in the dining room,
on the way to classes, and hence have opportunity to know her as
she naturally is, without embarrassment to her or to us should we
decide that she is not suitable material for our chapter. Having
come to know the girl well, then the fraternity girl feels free to
drop into the fraternity club house with her informally.

We all know the frantic efforts that Pan-Hellenic associations
everywhere are making to stop rushing. Pan-Hellenic rules do some
good; but, when the fraternities wake up to the fact that rushing
is unbecoming to the fraternity and a useless custom, then will come
the real reform. Then sophomore pledging will be looked on, not
as a hardship imposed by Pan-Hellenic and hence make one long
mad rush of the whole year, but as a real benefit because it gives
us time to know the new girl, and for her to know and appreciate
the fraternity. I f we live in the dormitory a whole year with a
girl, we can come pretty near knowing whether or not she will be
a desirable member for the fraternity.

My contention that rushing is worse than useless is not based
entirely on theory but on an actual incident. Since leaving college
I had this experience. I met a girl who had been to college and
joined a fraternity. Knowing that she had been bid by several
fraternities, I asked her what really determined her choice. Her

answer was, " I decided as I did chiefly because the girls in
didn't carry on so much over me and rush me to death. It made me
feel they were honoring me by asking me instead of my honoring
them by accepting."

Every fraternity girl, I suppose, thinks her own chapter's way
of doing things is best. I plead guilty to the charge. While I see
many things that could be bettered, yet I do think the arrangement
at Kappa is fundamentally right and could be used in an ideal
chapter. We live in dormitories where we can enter into every
phase of college life, are perfectly free to mingle with the whole
student body; yet we have a dear little bungalow on the campus
where we have all the joys of fraternity life. Oh, yes, we've had
envious longings for a house to live in, and I confess I was out of
college before I was even quite reconciled to not having one, yet
after all, I believe that under conditions such as we have, we are
blest in having only a club house, for I believe a dormitory is really
the ideal home for a girl at college.

MAMIE HURT BASKERVILLE, K '09.

98 TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

HIGH SCHOOL FRATERNITIES, ESPECIALLY AS RELATED

TO COLLEGE FRATERNITIES

By PROF. J O H N C A L V I N H A N N A , B 0 I I .

Principal of Oak Park, III., High School

College life is artificial rather than natural. The family being
based on sex, parenthood, and helplessness of childhood is a natural
institution. I t is difficult to conceive of any substitute for it that
would do the same work successfully. As life has grown more com-
plex with the advancement of civilization, the school has developed
to perform more conveniently through an institution some of the
functions of the family, and this development has culminated in the
public school. The public school, therefore, providing for the child-
ren and adolescents of the community certain training more conveni-
ently, more effectively, and more economically than is generally-
possible in the home, may be looked upon simply as a convenient,
effective, and economical extension of the family machinery for
taking care of certain of the family functions and therefore abso-
lutely under the immediate control of the family as expressed through
the local community of families and its chosen representatives. The
state steps in and to a certain extent regulates this institution simply
for its own self-preservation in making provision for an intelligent
and moral citizenship. The public school, therefore, including of
course the high school, is a natural institution and can hardly be
eliminated in any form of modern civilization, certainly not among
any self-governing people.

The college or university, on the other hand, is an artificial in-
stitution, and however it looms up to us as a necessity from any
viewpoint of our present day civilization, it is not a natural, but
artificial institution. It is, let us say, a means for culture, forgetting
that knowledge other than the obvious referred to in President
Hadley's definition. Or it is, let us say, an institution for acquiring
an immediate preparation for professional activities, or for certain
activities requiring a special training preceded by a general training.

But the world's history contains several conspicuous examples of
nations that have attained to a very high degree of civilization, that
have reached planes and pinnacles of culture, at least in some par-
ticulars, which excite the admiration and emulation of the best
thinkers of the present day, nations that never dreamed of college
or university and that never maintained anything analogous to what
we call college life. We can with a little freedom of thought and

TO PRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 99

imagination, conceive of some very high form of civilization, yet
to come, where colleges and college life will be wholly eliminated.
Such a change is not likely to come within any calculable period,
but it is not inconceiveable nor incompatible with what we feel
to be the essentials of a high civilization.

The begetting and rearing of children and the training of them for
intelligent citizenship in a free democracy, even the development of
highly trained leaders, could go on for centuries and with an in-
creasing effectiveness, even i f there were no colleges and no college
life in the sense in which we use those terms habitually.

But these things could not go on successfully with the aim of
keeping up the right and fit material for responsible, self-governing
citizenship without the public school. This we all believe, and thus
is demonstrated, it seems to me, the essential, fundamental and per-
manent difference between the college or university and the public
school. There is a great gulf here and it must be recognized in all
discussions concerning the life, the discipline and the activities of
these two institutions named, first the public school (including the
high school,) and second the college or university.

Before going on from this premise let us consider two seemingly
minor questions, and yet vital questions, that may naturally arise
at this point. First, shall we separate the state university from the
private university or college in this consideration? I t seems to me
not; it seems to me that in so far as the essential points of difference
that I have pointed out are concerned, a state university is to be
treated exactly as a private university or college. The aim of each is
to develop and train leaders for the activities of modern civilization.
This developing and training might be done in some other way than
by maintaining an institution which keeps young men and women
away from home and under a special regime for four years or more
in the period between youth and parenthood. Therefore, the arti-
ficiality is as truly manifest in the state university as in the private
university.

The other preliminary question is whether the high school shall
not be separated in this consideration from the lower school and
treated more like the college, dealing not with the three "R's"—the
fundamentals, but rather with the more special branches of know-
ledge, dealing in fact, in many of the stronger high schools, with
much of the same material and many of the same courses as might
be found thirty or forty years ago constituting a good share of the
curriculum of the average college. The difference between college
and high school is not so much in the subjects taught and studied,

100 TO PRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

nor even in the method of teaching and studying, as it is in the life
necessitated by the artificial institution. The college life, as contrast-
ed with the life belonging properly to the high school, in common
with all public schools, is, as has been said, merely an extension of
the family machinery for the training of its young in such matters
and in such ways as can be done more conveniently, more effectively
and more economically than by the family itself.

Now, what are the essential differences between college life and
high school life, particularly as related to problems connected with
the very greatly specialized institutions which we call fraternities?
Is there so great a difference in the life of eighteen to twenty-two
at college as compared with the life of fourteen to eighteen at home
that it should justify a wholly different attitude on the part of an
intelligent and impartial judge toward college fraternities and toward
high school fraternities?

Yes, there is exactly such a difference and the difference is im-
plied in the question. I t rests on the fact that the life in those earlier
years, fourteen to eighteen, is "at home," while the life in those later
years is "at college."

The highly artificial character of the college life is due to the
fact that hundreds of young men, or hundreds of young women,
or hundreds of both young men and young women are living for
four years away from home and in a group together, largely isolated
from those surroundings and associations that have been familiar to
them all their lives so far, cut off from close daily contact with parents
and brothers and sisters, and having those many and involved ties,
relationships and influences broken, strained, suspended, weakened—
reduced oftentimes to nil—and always placed suddenly, thoroughly,
and to all appearances, permanently, in a secondary position.

Here is the youth thrown largely on his own resources—away
from home ties and influences as they were in the family of his
father and mother—and not yet facing the interests, attractions
and responsibilities of his own family which are to come to him
after he leaves this artificial, narrow, contracted, intense and yet,
in some senses, remote and almost monastic life. Here, i f ever, he
will make blunders—do foolishly. Here are lonesomeness, awk-
wardness, and the possibility of folly that may bring lasting sorrow.

The need for the helpfulness, encouragement, sympathy and re-
straining influence of close kin is as great or almost as great as in the
years just preceding. Here is where brotherhood, the artificial
brotherhood and sisterhood of the college fraternity, comes forward
to supply that very real need. Here the helping hand, the encourag-

TO PRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 101

ing smile, the sympathetic advice, the restraining fraternal influence
of brother and sister in the new relation of the Greek letter society,
as the world calls it—the college fraternity, as we call it—here is
where the new tie comes to take the place and, to a certain and very
considerable extent, to make good the loss, of these earlier natural(
ties of the family out from whose bosom the timid and ignorant fresh-
man has so lately come.

This is the function of the college fraternity. This is the great
need in the college world which is more or less perfectly supplied
by men's college fraternities with their 589 chapters, and by the
women's fraternities with their 381 chapters, which have grown up
within the last eighty-seven years in the American colleges.

Whether these important and powerful institutions are perfect or
not, whether they have serious faults or not, whether some other
better way could be devised of meeting this profound and almost
universal social need of the college world of America—all these
questions, while in themselves important, are beside the point of
this discussion. Whether you or I or any other theorist might
imagine or devise as an ideal plan for taking care, socially, of the
unsophisticated freshman with his large capacity for making mis-
takes, the fact remains that this, the college fraternity, is at present,
and has been for three quarters of a century, practically the only
means for meeting and supplying the need.

The American college has kept pace—though no doubt at a re-
spectful and conservative interval in the rear—still it has, in some
sense, kept pace with the crying need, intellectually, of the youth
that swarms to its doors. I t has even, to some extent, often blunder-
ingly and stupidly, provided some equipment and even some expert
supervision of the physical need of that same swarming body of
young men and young women. I t has, in many cases, taken the
attitude of looking sharply after its moral needs—though with little
uniformity and oftentimes not constructively. But as to its social
needs not at all—almost absolutely not at all.

And therefore there has grown up spontaneously the great college
fraternity system to supply that need, under conditions the most
critical, when the situation cries out for something—something—
something to prevent the sudden separation from the old family left
at home and the necessary postponement of the new family yet to
come, to prevent I say, this separation and postponement from en-
tailing untold harm upon the body, mind and soul of the young men
and women, to whom it offers brotherhood, sisterhood, fraternity.

The errors and faults in this system should have the unprejudiced,

102 TO PRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

fair minded, loyal and devoted attention of the officers and alumni
of these institutions, to the end that the unfavorable criticisms may
be met by reforms, that the inefficiencies of the system may be
remedied, that the coming youth may be, each year, more and more
helped and not harmed, made nobler, happier, stronger, and more
unselfish. God speed the day, man and woman together strive for
the day, when snobbishness among fraternity men and women may
become unpopular, when extravagance may be looked upon as be-
neath their standard of refinement, when exclusiveness may be kept
from causing pain, when fraternity loyalty may be considered genuine
only when united with a broad and generous friendliness toward
those who are for one cause or another outside the charmed circle
of intimate friendship, when coarseness and brutality in initiation
may be eliminated utterly from the induction ceremonies of those
brotherhoods and sisterhoods which proudly claim a superiority over
all other societies in their standard of selection, in their aims and
activities, and in the manhood and womanhood which they develop.
I say again, God speed that day.

But whatever their faults and their deficiencies, however slowly
the blundering youth may be led to realize the nobility and sweet-
ness of these higher standards toward which the leaders of all men's
and women's college fraternities are striving, it remains that these are
the only established means and institutions for supplying that need
for brotherhood which is deep and vital and which must be supplied.
This, the great argument for college fraternity, is weighty enough
to more than counterbalance all the arguments which are brought
against the system.

Let us now turn our attention to the high schools and to the boys
and girls who fill them. I t is of course true that at this age they
have social needs and social longings just as truly as they have when,
averaging four years older, they are sent away to college.

But—they are not sent away to high school. They are kept at
home. They live in their own families, of which each of them
constitutes as he has since his birth, an integral and active part,
with all the privileges, opportunities, protection and responsibility
of an active member of the family. His social interests are looked
after by his family. Here are father and mother watchful to see
that the growing boy and girl of their own household are developed,
encouraged, advised, restrained and trained socially. Here are
brotherhood and sisterhood not only, but here are fatherhood and
motherhood—all f u l l of loyalty, familiarity, sympathy, pride,
common interest. Here is every element necessary for social train-

TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 103

ing in the fullest and best sense of the word. Here are neighbors
and friends and schoolmates—all well known and familiar from
infancy. Here is the old swimming hole, here is the ragweed
diamond on the back lot with an old chum calling for "Skinny"
to "come on over"—"Go ast yer maw i f you can't c'm' over." There's
the whole thing in a nutshell—"Go ast yer maw i f you can't c'm'
over." Here is no need for membership, pledging, initiations,
badges, chapter meetings, secret grips, passwords, coat-of-arms, ban-
ners, rivalries, et cetera. "Skinny" is provided for by his "maw" and
needeth not a formal and artificial brotherhood. No more does
Susie with her blue ribboned pigtail down her back. I t belongs
not with adolescents and is a mere aping of and so an unconscious
burlesque of the tinsel machinery of the college fraternity without
its need and without its spirit.

A l l froth and all decay and all excrescence connected with any
or all college fraternities is imitated, selected, developed, exagger-
ated and made triply offensive by the high school "frat."

Do Beta Theta Pi delegates at a convention in a moment of en-
thusiasm form a chain gang at some big hotel to let off their
exuberant reverence for John Reily Knox, exciting the good
humored contempt of the porch lounger and the head waiter?
Then do the members of Upsilon Zeta Pi, a high school "frat,"
with ribbons streaming, form a chain gang and parade the streets
of their peaceful town, .exciting the jealousy and envy of school-
mates who "got stung" by not being admitted to this brand new
and most exclusive organization. Did Sigma Chi in primitive days
maintain a sub-rosa chapter at Princeton in more or less success-
f u l defiance of the rules of that venerable college? Then do X i
Beta Gamma and Phi Phi Phi, high school fraternities and sororities,
take delight in admitting secretly to their membership every harum-
scarum youngster in the Bigtown high school, and concocting fan-
tastic theories of honesty and dishonesty whereby they may put
over a safe lie when questioned by the authorities as to their mem-
bership.

Is there occasionally a college friendship of a month's standing
between dormitory roommates cooled by the fact that Miss Luella
joins Kappa Kappa Gamma while Miss Clarissa does not? Then
does Psi Gamma Psi, a most superior and aristocratic high school
sorority, take delight in breaking up a lifelong intimacy between
neighbors and friends by admitting Marie Smyth whose father has
an auto, and forbidding her longer to associate with Mary Jones
next door whose father has not.

104 TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

These absurdities and these exasperating wrongs, as all of us
know, are not burlesque nor caricature, they are simply photo-
graphs—samples of abuses and evils that are widely, almost uni-
versally, prevalent.

Before going farther, let me meet one or two possible criticisms
upon my rather highly rhetorical argument.

Says one, "The picture about Skinny and Susie is not a fair one
because that is a picture of 'kidhood,' not of the more developed
and dignified youth of the high school, who is vastly more like a
college man or woman than he is like the childish heroes and
heroines of the Tribune's cartoons on 'The Day of Real Sport.' "
Superficially and in some minor and unessential particulars let us
grant that he is, but not vitally nor in the major and essential
particulars.

Saith holy writ, "For this cause, ( i . e. the sex cause) a man
leaveth his father and mother and cleaveth unto his wife and they
twain become one flesh." And when we "to college go" we leave
the father and the mother and go through a special training away
from home to fit us for that cleaving unto the wife—that new
responsibility that is to come with all that it brings.

And when we go to college we no longer "ask maw," we decide
for ourselves, and the transition is so sudden and the contrast so
intense because of being thrown—not with "the world" in general
as would be the case without college life—but thrown with a great
number of other social units all similarly situated, that we greatly
need this temporary brotherhood which the fraternity supplies.

But the high school adolescent still must "ast his maw." She
provides his meals and his hours are conformed to her and her
household of which she is queen and of which he is a part, subject
to that queen. And the high school fraternity and sorority is not
a means of assisting that social queen in caring for her subjects
socially, but rather an artificial, interfering, unnecessary, elaborate,
and pestiferous organization directly interfering with the wise, sane
administration of that household and of the public school, which
is an extension of that household for certain specific purposes.

Amidst all the excitements and struggles, the pros and cons and
ups and downs of the discussion that has raged in a thousand com-
munities in regard to high school fraternities and sororities, this
one fundamental and inevitable truth is coming more and more
clearly to be recognized by teachers, school officers, parents, com-
munities, school boards, and legislatures—that these organizations
do not supply a real need, that they are imitative and f u l l of the

r

TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 105

faults, greatly exaggerated, of their models, the college fraternities,
with a hundred others added of their own, and that they are in
the way, a detriment, a hindrance, a positive evil, a nuisance oper-
ating against the aims and good work of family and school and
church, (for examples are not wanting of direct and disastrous
interference with the good work of the church.)

As this truth becomes manifest, steps are being taken here and
there all over the country to restrain, discourage, forbid and abolish
the high school fraternity and sorority. Twelve states have already
passed severe statutes against them. Many local school boards in
these and in many other states have taken the same or similar action.
Courts have universally supported these bodies in their control of
the organizations. The movement is going on to a complete
abolition of them and to the getting rid of this excrescence upon
the public school which has brought about so much pain and sorrow
and bitterness, which has injured so seriously many fine boys and
girls who become members of them, which has never helped any
college fraternity in any worthy sense, and which has done no good
of any importance to counterbalance all the evil, and nothing good
that could not have been as well and better accomplished without it.

The intelligent assistance of college men and women is needed
in this reform. Especially is the intelligent assistance needed of
college fraternity men and women. They above all others can
furnish an expert knowledge of the spirit and aims and workings of
college fraternities, of real fraternities, and can show inquiring and
interested parties why these mock fraternities are useless and harmful.

The duty of college fraternities, in my judgment, i f for no other
reason than to furnish support which can not come so intelligently
nor so effectually from any other source to a real reform in edu-
cational matters, their duty, I say, as well as their especial privilege,
is to assist vigorously and actively in eliminating the high school
fraternity and sorority. They can contribute an inside knowledge
of these matters that will do much to secure prompt and intelligent
action all over the country. I f the college fraternities, men's and
women's, would write in a frank expression of opinion, a judgment
opposed to the high school imitations, and an action excluding from
their membership after a fixed date in the future all who have ever
joined any high school fraternity or sorority, that action would put
an everlasting quietus on them and the world would be happier
and better off.

Furthermore such action on the part of the college fraternities
would tend to bring about wise rather than blundering legislation.

106 TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

discriminating rather than reckless and sweeping legislation, such
as has already been passed in one or more states eliminating "secret
societies" from all educational institutions controlled by that state.
This is the kind of blundering that is likely to come about i f this
reform is left to those who are not intimately familiar with the real
character of the college fraternity system and the essential differ-
ence between this and the institution in high school which these
reformers are determined to get rid of.

I f this hint is not sufficient to lead the college fraternities to
united action in this matter then I can only say "Ephraim is wedded
to his idols" and the college fraternities will deserve the loss of their
chapters in the state institutions.

The college fraternities can do this thing. They ought to do this
thing. For their own self-preservation they must do this thing.

—Copied from Banta's Greek Exchange.

THE SITUATION AT BARNARD

FRATERNITIES ARE REACTIONARY, USELESS A N D DEMOCRACY'S

E N E M Y , SAYS MISS KIRCHWEY OF BARNARD

"The admission must finally come that fraternities are reactionary
and useless, affording little more than pleasure to those in them,
nothing better than excitement to those outside, and by their mere
presence preventing the college from its very birthright of dem-
ocracy."

I n this way Miss Freda Kirchwey of Barnard College sums up the
fraternity question in an article in the October Barnard Bear, en-
titled "Fraternities Versus Democracy."

Miss Kirchwey asks whether the system can be reformed or
whether the evils are too longstanding and too fundamental, and
her only answer is that the evils are the root and substance of the
organization. Without secrecy, she contends, without petty regu-
lations, without exaggerated loyalty and artificial bond, without
social distinctions and the snobbery that inevitably accompanies
them, without a certain unavoidable amount of politics—without all
of these, no fraternity can exist and be a fraternity. In her article
she says:

"Every organization in college is supposedly formed to fill some
special need, to serve some definite purpose, and no organization has
a right to exist unless it continuously and efficiently does the things
it was called into being to accomplish. Therefore the question

TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 107

should arise in everyone's mind and should be answered to every-
one's satisfaction—'What need do the fraternities fill? What pur-
pose do they serve?' I t is easy to answer superficially; to say that
fraternities are simply the expression of the tendency of a college
to split up into groups; and as to their purpose, they serve to bring
together congenial girls and hence to weld lasting friendships.

"But a spirit of closer investigation would prompt an outsider
to ask, 'Why is it necessary or beneficial for such groups to be organ-
ized—does that not rob them of their naturalness and at the same
time endow them with plainly undemocratic traits?

"And what is the effect on the girls who do not get in? Of course,
they lose the good things you say a fraternity provides for its mem-
bers, but in addition do they not often gain positive harm in regard
to their general outlook on life?

"According to the outline of the purpose and formation of fra-
ternities, members must be chosen wholly on grounds of congeniality;
but is this so? Are there no artificial restrictions on membership?

"Have fraternities, organized as they are, any influence on politics?
Is there any fraternity or anti-fraternity feeling evident in college
elections ?'

" I f there were any such interested and intruding outsider, he
would surely deserve a complete answer, and when the facts were
told our fraternity system would find itself sadly discredited in his
eyes.

"We should have to say that the hard-and-fast organization of
the fraternities and the wall of secrecy thrown up around them rob
them of any pretentions at being natural, informal groups of con-
genial people. I f they were only natural, congenial groups there
would be no pride in an invitation to join, no disappointment in
being left out, and no social distinction attached to the membership.
For surely no girl could expect the reward of social distinction for
the noble quality of being able to jibe with other girls!

"As things now stand, however, invitations to fraternities are more
or less coveted, and girls who are not asked are often sorely dis-
appointed. They cannot help feeling that in some way they have
been weighed and found wanting, that they lack some personal force
or undefinable social quality that would make them desirable—which
is a bitter pill for the least sensitive person to swallow gracefully.

"Besides this, no Hebrews are taken in, and this factor alone is
damning evidence that fraternities fail as a college institution, that
they maintain mediaeval standards, and have not reached a point
where they can judge people as separate individuals.

108 TO PRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

" I t has been asserted that in elections to offices fraternity con-
nections have no weight; and truly they do seem to count less than
in most fraternity-ridden colleges. But is there any one here, active
and interested, who will deny knowledge of one or more offices
filled as they are because the girl elected was in some certain fra-
ternity—or because she was in none? I n other words, the outcome
of a certain number of elections are inevitably determined by the
strength of either a fraternity or a non-fraternity sentiment."

At the first meeting of the class of 1916, temporary officers were
elected as follows:

Chairman—Miss Carol R. Lorenz of New York ; Secretary—
Miss Louise Talbot of Baltimore; Chairman of the Constitution
Committee—Miss Emma Seipp of New York.

According to the traditions of the even classes, the juniors and
freshmen were united last Friday at a most successful mock wedding.
Miss Louise Fox, the reverend for the occasion, joined Miss Talbot
and Miss Fitch in the name of their respective classes, " t i l l gradua-
tion shall you part and then some." Red handkerchiefs supported
by the couple's parents lent color to the occasion. The affair, con-
cerning both college and matrimony, was rounded out by much
feasting and singing.

A number of changes in the staff of instructors at Barnard have
been made since last spring. New appointments are those of
Luther H . Alexander, Instructor in Romance Languages and Litera-
tures; Earl W. Crecraft, Instructor in Politics; William S. Messer,
Instructor in Classical Philology; Laura C. Brant, Assistant in
Physics; Ella H . Clark and Ruth S. Finch, Assistants in Chemistry.
The vacancies left by the recent resignations of Niels C. Christensen,
Lecturer in Geology, and Emilie J. Hutchinson, Assistant in History,
have been filled by the appointment of Freeman F. Burr and Juliet
S. Points, who returns to Barnard after two years' study in England.

The character of the Deutscher Kreis was very much altered at an
important meeting of the club recently held. The requirements
for entrance into the Kreis were raised, so that now only those
students who are taking third year German, or a higher German
course, and also those who have entered on intermediate German,
are eligible. Membership in the Kreis will hereafter be by invitation
only, and will be controlled by a membership committee.

TO PRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 109

BARNARD A N D FRATERNITIES

Miss KIRCHWEY'S ARTICLE FOLLOWED B Y QUESTIONS I N

COLLEGE WEEKLY

In answer to Miss Kirchwey's article on fraternities in the Bar-
nard Bear the following questions have been asked in the college
weekly paper:

1. Which colleges have abolished fraternities?—for we hear that several
of the most important have. What reasons were given? What effect did
it have? What was substituted, if anything?

2. Is there no other way for college girls to make friends but by rigid
organization? Do the members all really become friends, or do they split
up within their number, as human nature will?

3. Have these girls any means of getting rid of one of their number who
proves a mistake?

4. How do such inflexible groupings make room for growth and change,
development, or retrogression in a girl's character? Doesn't this necessary
change often break up the close friendship, and don't the girls seek friends
outside the fraternity to meet their new needs?

5. What benefits are there beyond the wearing of the little pin?—beyond
the mediaeval pleasure in knowing something which is hidden to your fellows?

6. Why deny these benefits, if any, to your own friends who do not happen
to wear the pin ?

7. Doesn't a girl often have the power to keep another girl out of a fra-
ternity and its benefits from a personal grudge?

8. More important than these—what particular privileges have fraternities
at Barnard? Can any group, for instance, engage our Brinkerhoff Theatre
for a dance? Have the fraternities special rooms for themselves in the
college, &c.

9 . The fraternities have been accused of electioneering and trying to con-
trol college politics. In how far is the fraternity a political machine? Is
there any rule that members shall vote in a body? What is the meaning of
such expressions as "We have thirty votes for Fanny"?

10. Do the fraternities never attempt to "corner the market" in the Bear
and Bulletin, or the class presidencies or other offices?

1 1 . Don't they ever enlist the service of influential girls without letting
them share their benefits? I f they are willing to use these girls why don't
they give them the little gold emblem? I f it means nothing, why have it?
Can't we get beyond that in the twentieth century?

12. I f it does not mean much, why not open it to all? Why not have fifty
fraternities and let every girl who is not absolutely objectionable be asked
into one of them? We have heard that such was the situation in American
colleges when fraternities were first started. Wasn't it so?

13. Who controls the forming of new fraternities? The Faculty or the
Undergraduate Association, or both? Why wasn't the Hebrew fraternity
officially recognized, or was if? &c.

Dramatics are coming to the foreground as the winter draws on.
The sophomore show, which will be produced on Nov. 15, will be
"His Majesty the Governor." Irving Ottenberg is coach, and Miss
Ray Levi, Chairman of the committee.

1 1 0 TO PRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

THE DEVELOPMENT OF T H E FIRST MASSACHUSETTS

SCHOOLS

By LESLIE HOOPER, DELTA ' 1 4

Progress and education march hand in hand. We find this to be
true in the history of all civilized countries. One of the strongest
links in the chain which held the wonderful Roman Empire together
was its highly organized school system. Charlemagne appreciated
the value of education and established a school which shines out
alone in the darkness of his age. Martin Luther and Melanchthon
clearly saw the need of schools, as also did John Knox and many
other makers of history. I n the history of all countries we find
schools regarded as most valuable, important, and indispensable
institutions.

To understand fully the origin of our school, we must study care-
fully the men who originated our school system and the time in
which they lived. Fortunately they lived in an age of great intel-
lectual awakening. The embers of the fire of Elizabeth's brilliant
reign were still glowing. Warmed by these embers, the Puritans
were among the best educated men in Fmgland. They were for the
most part, men of university training, freeholders, gentlemen, and
men of brains. As history shows us, there were many religious and
political obligations in England which they considered unjustifiable
and unendurable. As a result they went to Holland where they
hoped to have freedom from these things. They found there religi-
ous and political freedom, but they also found many unpleasant
conditions with which they had not reckoned. Being educated people
themselves, they naturally wished their children to have the same
advantages. Consequently they sent their children to the Dutch
schools. Soon the children acquired Dutch customs, married into
Dutch families, and gradually lost many of their English character-
istics. . This condition of affairs was so entirely unsatisfactory that
it finally led to the well known emigration of the Puritans to New
England. The Puritans were essentially men of strong religious
inclinations and of high intellectual acquirements. They believed
in their religion and believed in it sincerely. Consequently, their
new colony was to be one of fine moral stamp'. Side by side with
their religion their education was to be fostered, for religion and
education are mutually helpful. This is shown clearly by the
mediaeval monasteries. The monks kept alive a spark of intellect-
uality during the period in which the countries of the old world
were shrouded in darkness.

The Puritans were not in their new home long before they began

TO PRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 111

to turn their attention to the education of their children. Had they
not established some kind of schools, many plausible excuses might
have been offered by historians and accepted by the readers of history.
Among these excuses would have been: the colonists early trouble
with the Indians, their difficulty in raising crops, their frequent
lack of sufficient food supplies, and their constant sickness and death
during the early years of hardship and struggle.

Of course, the Puritans were busy getting settled for the first
few years but during this time they never lost sight of the impor-
tance of educational facilities for the young. At first families in
the same district got together to provide tutors for their children.
This was the origin of the school district which has played an im-
portant role in our American school system. Soon it seemed more
satisfactory to have the town minister educate the children at his
house, which was furnished, often times, by the people of the town.
He was usually a man of good education and a graduate of one of
the larger English universities. One of these early preachers said,
"God sifted a whole nation that he might send choice grain over
into this wilderness." When the town-meeting houses were first
built, provision in them was made for a school room. Gradually
the town meetings became such frequent and such noisy affairs that
it was deemed advisable and necessary to provide a school room else-
where. Thus developed the American district school.

These first school houses were quaint little buildings, not at all
resembling the fine brick structures now to be seen in our larger
towns and cities. They were situated in vacant lots, one story high,
low in the eaves, and unable even to boast a coat of paint. A rough,
large, unhewn slab, the former resident of a neighboring pasture,
served admirably as a doorstep. Upon entering the building, one
first passes through an entry deserving of notice. I t extends the
width of the building and serves several purposes. On the wall is
a row of wooden pegs on which the Puritan scholars hung their
coats. A long shelf occupied another bit of wall space and on this
shelf one might find many different receptacles serving the children
as lunch boxes. I n the winter time about half the room was given
over to firewood, which had been cut and drawn by the scholars'
parents. The entry opened into the school room proper, where, as
Whittier says:

"The master's desk is seen,
Deep scarred by raps official;
The warping floor, the battered seats
The jack-knife's carved initial."

And truly the master's desk is seen for it looms up like a pulpit

112 TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

above the wooden benches. A t one side of the desk was an air-
tight stove which was kept filled with burning logs during the short
winter days. The benches must have been extremely hard before the
end of the day, for they were merely large two-inch planks. A l l
the support the pupils had at their backs was the equally hard
planks which served those behind them as desks. The wall was
covered by a wooden wainscot which was broken only by two or
three high windows.

The master of these early schools was, almost without exception,
a Harvard graduate and often a clergyman. The colonists spared
themselves nothing in securing their school master, as they considered
it their solemn duty to procure the best of instructors, realizing that
in this way they were fitting their children to help found the great
American Commonwealth. These masters kept up the interest in the
classics among the older pupils and began the ordinary course of
studies with the younger children. The studies which were taken
up in the lower classes were principally the three R's—reading,
writing and arithmetic. The'children had no primers in which they
learned their letters and in which they acquired ability in reading;
the Bible served them for both purposes.

There were no girls in these schools nor were there any women
teachers. Women were not considered able enough to guide the
young in their pursuit of learning, nor was it considered necessary
for the girls to have as good an education as their brothers. In
those days women did not travel about, did not know other women
in the neighboring towns, nor enter into any form of business what-
so-ever. Consequently, there was no need of their having the train-
ing which their brothers received. However, there were several private
schools for girls, of which women could avail themselves i f they saw
fit.

A t first no fixed rules were set down by the colony for the estab-
lishment and maintenance of schools so there arose various methods
of support for the school as well as various rules and orders for con-
ducting them. The development of the schools of the Town of Dor-
chester has effected, perhaps, more lasting and important results
than that of any other town and is, therefore, especially worthy of
notice.

Dorchester was the first town to appoint a school committee to
have complete management of the public schools. This body of men
was the first of its kind in the world and from its example has
grown up the splendid school system of America, which is controlled
today by just such bodies of men chosen by the municipalities. A t
one of these earliest meetings of the Dorchester school committee

TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 113

some "Rules and Orders Concerning the Schools" were passed.
From our twentieth century point of view these are extremely inter-
esting. They prescribe the hours for holding school sessions as
follows: "That from the first moneth vntill the end of the 7th, hee
(the master) shall eury day beginn to teach at seaven of the Clock
in the morning and dismisse his schollers at fyue in the afternoone.
And for the other fyue months, that is from the beginning of the
8th month vntill the end of the 12th month he shall eury day be-
ginn at 8 of the clock in the morning, & (end) at 4 in the after-
noone." They enacted another rule which made it the master's duty
to examine all the pupils every Monday on the sermon of the Sab-
bath day and on the Catechism. He was permitted to use his own
discretion in punishing the "schollers" who did not come up to
the mark. Other rules were made dealing with provision for fuel,
boarding the school master and other like matters.

The establishment of the school committee took the authority out
of the hands of a few parents who might be interested in their
children's educational training and put it into the hands of the town.
Many of the other towns followed Dorchester's example in organ-
izing a school committee and in making education obligatory. Gradu-
ally all the responsibility was put upon the town as is shown by
many of the old records, as; "towne shall set up a gramer schoole."
"Towne shall pay 5£ and i f any towne neglect ye performance hereof
above one yeare j " "the town shall supply the school with an able
and sufficient Schoolemaster." The colony made no set rules as to
the salary for the master but left that question optional to the towns.
"Wages shall be paid either by ye parents or masters of such children,
or by ye inhabitants in generall, by way of supply."

Thus it was that the form of education which our ancestors estab-
lished, passed out of the hands of the parents and into the control
of the towns and the state. Although Massachusetts may rightly
claim the establishment of the first free public school system, the
other New England colonies should not be entirely overlooked.
Pancoast says, " I t was in New England that popular education, the
only foundation on which a republic such as ours can safely rest,
was begun."

The descendants of these sturdy, sincere Puritans should be ex-
ceedingly proud of such ancestors, as should all of the descendants
of the founders of our American commonwealth, whether of New
England or any of the other colonies. Surely we should try to
benefit by our inheritance and do all i n our power to continue the
good works which were started by the first settlers of Massachusetts.

114 TO DRAGMA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI

WOMAN'S DAY ACTIVITIES

THE PRE-PANAMA EXPOSITION AT STANFORD UNIVERSITY

The women of Stanford University have no special day they may
call their own, but a tradition is growing up that some time during
the year they shall give a sort of Stunt Night or Kirmiss to increase
the fund for their much longed for club house. The affair is inspired
and controlled by Cap and ( jown, the honor society of some twelve
representative senior women. This year's venture was so amazingly
successful that I pass it on to you.

Handbills and posters plastered the campus and neighboring towns
announcing a Pre-Panama Exposition to be held on two floors of
the zoology building and promising endless means of wresting nick-
els and dimes from an entranced public. Three hundred odd dollars
were invested in booths and stages, but all else was donated by the
sororities, clubs, and organizations represented.

Alpha Omicron Pi had a very cozy and attractive Mexican house
made of Indian blankets and their costumes were gay with red and
yellow. Three of the girls read palms while the rest saw to it that
every man in sight was tagged with at least two small Mexican hats,
chances on a Stanford bronze shield which was mysteriously encased
in an enormous tamale of brown tissue paper.

Next to them stood a gondola from which Venetian girls sold
violets, and a little further on Southern girls in white flounced dresses
danced and sang songs of Dixie. Dutch maidens in a Delft blue
windmill served chocolate from behind pots of daffodils. Ice cream
came out of an Eskimo hut of white cotton and coffee from the hands
of seemingly real Turkish ladies, trousers and a l l ! Cowboy girls
in a country store sold sweet cider and manipulated a crude roulette
wheel which burdened the lucky number with an infinitesimal cake
of soap or bottle of perfume. Girls from fair Japan beckoned you
from a tea house of fruit blossoms to try your luck at fan tan (that
. China should not be wholly forgotten!) and in a small jungle of
bamboo Hawaiians served pineapple and raffled an eighteen dollar
euchalali.

The faculty ladies disposed of homemade pies and cakes, candy and
doughnuts, while the alumnae conducted a turkey shoot. Speaking
of "shoot" I wish you might have seen the people seated on sofa
cushions sliding down matting-covered boards which were laid over
the stairs leading into the basement. The criers called "Nickel a
Slide; Heaven and Hell at the bottom," which somehow promised so