College Fraternities

COLLEGE FRATERNITIES

BY A FRATERNITY MAN

Stories of college life are more or less familiar to everyone but there is one chapter of college life which very few people know anything about, a phase in the development and education of young men which is almost as important as the college course itself. This unknown institution is the college fraternity. How few people who never attended college have ever heard of a college fraternity, and how few even of all those who have attended college known anything about a fraternity.

A fraternity is an association of young men living together with brotherly and harmonious feeling always existing among them. It is a secret organization; its name, motto, grip, symbol, its internal organization and working are never known except to members.

Perhaps the best way of plainly setting forth the main features of fraternities would be to describe an average fraternity. Think of twenty bright young men, all of the best families, united by the bonds of a fraternal organization, living and boarding together in one large house and you have the first impression of a fraternity.

If the fraternity is an old established one there will be a reception hall, a library, parlor, a smoking room fitted up with long padded window seats, big, cosy arm chairs and a wide old fashioned grate in which a cheerful blaze is always found, and a dining room and kitchen. Of course on the second floor are numerous study rooms and bed rooms, and then in the farthest away corner, on the third floor or in the basement, is the mystic chapter hall which no one but members can enter and in which the secret weekly meetings are held.

In a large university like Cornell, Harvard or Michigan, the life of the average student is a very dull uninteresting one. His daily routine of study and classes finished, he is left to himself oftentimes in a lonely room far away from acquaintances. He is obliged to go out to find companionship and he often wonder what it is that keeps him out of the activities and the swim of the college atmosphere, why it is he isn't keen to what goes on about him and why he doesn't so readily hear of college doings. The answer is plain enough - he isn't associated with the centers of college spirit. Those centers are found in the fraternities, and that is the most striking advantage of fraternity life. The fraternity man is associated with twenty of the finest men in college, men who are thoroughly acquainted with college politics, and athletics, men of influence and distinction, and who, taken altogether, embrace all phases of college activities. He consequently finds himself in an atmosphere of activity, spirit and enterprise that cannot be found elsewhere.

There certainly are fewer inducements to study in a fraternity, but it cannot be doubted that in the end one knows more of life, is better able to appreciate what he finds about him, finds more to laugh at, and finds more good and noble traits of character about him which influence his life.

In the long winter evenings the boys gather about the smoking room and sing rousing college songs, chant their fraternity odes full of hidden meaning, relate stories and experiences by the hour. A dull colored light and the soft glow from the embers in the grate are conducive to harmony and congeniality with one another and each fellow opens up his very nature and gives to his fellow companions the best that's in him. Problems are discussed and all sorts of things talked about, and in this way in these quiet hours there springs up an everlasting intimacy among the boys, a feeling that their lives are linked to one another. This influence is always elevating; each one endeavoring to show the others that he is worthy of the confidence placed in him when he was elected to become a member of this select member. The interests and doings of the boys are common and if one fails in his work all the others feel an individual concern about it and help him all that's possible. This intimacy is fostered of course by the fraternal bond and the common interest of each fellow in advancing the position and influence of his fraternity in the college world. This extreme intimacy among such fellows as the best fraternities endeavor to get, can't help but be refining, elevating, and educating.

One of the most interesting things about a fraternity is the manner in which it gets its members. During the vacations the boys look about for promising men who intend going to college next year; the alumni of the fraternity are on the look out for good men and send their names to the other members of the college; in these and in various other ways good men are recommended. The best fraternities are very particular that their men should come from the best families and that their home standing should be entirely commendable. In the fall these men are looked up when college opens, invited to the fraternity house and are entertained in various ways, always with the view of giving them favorable impressions of the fraternity and also to give the members good opportunities to look them over. This is called "rushing." Of course the same prospective member may have been recommended to several different fraternities all of which "rush" him, and if he is a desireable man he has the opportunity of choice and can take that fraternity which pleases him most. When a man is asked to join a fraternity it is called being "bid", but of course no man is "bid" who has not first received the unanimous secret ballot of all members. There are score of recommended men every year who do not favorably impress all members of the fraternity. Thus it can be seen that a college fraternity is one of the most exclusive organizations in the world; its members being representatives of the best fellows from the best families, chosen only by secret ballot from hundreds of recommendations.

After graduation, a fraternity man maintains his connections with his fraternity. His reminiscences of college are always filled with the happy times that centered around his fraternity. He likes to keep in touch with the younger men; he often visits them, and though all the fellows he knew in college may have long ago gone he feels the same old intimacy towards the new ones. He advises them, helps them "rush" in the fall, and if he is a man of wealth he spends it freely for their benefit in such ways as fixing over or refitting the house. At the usual annual alumni reunion at commencement time, the graduates and active chapter members are drawn closely together, and that brotherly feeling and interest in each other is intensified, which is felt to no such degree in no other organization in the world. What is it that keeps alive the interest of the alumni? It is neither material gain nor social position, but it is simply love for the old college fraternity and a heartfelt desire to build up and strengthen the active chapter.

A large university is filled with men from every part of the country. In one fraternity in the University of Michigan eighteen states were represented. In after-college-life this is a matter of great advantage considering that wherever you go you are sure now and them to meet a man of your own fraternity, and that that same brotherly interest and harmony lives at all times and in all places.

It takes years and years to establish a large and string alumni because the fraternity is increased each year by so few men, and indeed it is very fortunate if in fifty years its living alumni numbers two hundred. Usually there is an alumni association formed for each chapter of the fraternity, who are associated for no other purpose than to aid the active chapter. It is in this way through the efforts of the associated alumni that those magnificent fraternity houses are built and equipped.

When a fraternity house is built, one alumnus in the stone business may donate the stone, another the wood work and so on, while the actual money needed is furnished by the association. The most magnificent fraternity house in the world in the Chi Psi house at Cornell. Other fine Cornell fraternities are the Zeta Psi, Theta Delta Chi and Kappa Alpha houses. William college ranks first in fraternity property actually owned and the University of Michigan second. The find beautiful houses of the Zeta Psi, Sigma Phi, Alpha Delta Phi, Delta Kappa Epsilon and Psi Upsilon fraternities at the University of Michigan built at an average cost of about $30,000 each cannot be equalled in any college or university in the world. Michigan is the greatest fraternity college in the country, the majority of the fraternities however have not long been established and rent their houses.

Fraternities were first established in eastern colleges about 1840. They struggled long against the ill will of faculties and other opposition until about 1870 from which time to the present their growth has been so strong and steady that now the whole fabric of college institution - athletics, politics, oratorical and lecture course associations - rests upon the spirit and action of the fraternities.

Of course there are several chapters of each fraternity in as many different colleges; a fraternity organized at one college may establish chapters in other colleges. The number of active chapters of the various fraternities varies all the way from four to nearly a hundred, but the average number of chapters for each fraternity however is about twenty-five. Each year usually a national convention of each fraternity is held to which all the chapters send delegates. In this convention the national policy of the fraternity is discussed, chapters established or taken away and efforts made to make their fraternity the strongest in the land. As a rule any fraternity man can go from one chapter to another in case he desires to complete his college work at another institution. This establishes a united national collegiate brotherhood.

By the steady growth of college fraternal organizations, fraternities have become large exclusive organizations embracing the most intelligent and best educated men of our country, and typifying those intimate relations of man to man which makes us better able to appreciate all that we have on the social side of life, friends, companionship and education.