@syracusehistory is one of my favorite instagram accounts. Here’s a recent post about Alpha Epsilon Phi’s chapter house.
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The first fraternity at Syracuse University, the Phi Gamma chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon was chartered on November 17, 1871. It was one of the first chapters to have a chapter house at Syracuse. In the late 1890s, a chapter house fund was started and plans were made to build a house. Alumni Edwin H. Gaggin, Class of 1892, and T. Walker Gaggin, Class of 1895, designed the chapter house at Walnut Avenue and University Place (pictured below ). The house opened in 1903.
The Former Delta Kappa Epsilon Chapter House at Syracuse University
The 1970s were not kind to the Greek system at Syracuse University and the chapter moved to smaller quarters on Comstock Avenue. In 1974, the DKE house was sold to the University and it became the Faculty Center. In 1997, it was dedicated as the Goldstein Alumni and Faculty Center, named for Alfred and Ann Goldstein.
The Dekes now reside at 703 Walnut Avenue in what had been the Phi Delta Theta house. The home next to the Chancellor’s Residence was built in 1903 and originally belonged to Horace Wilkinson.
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The Daily Orange, Syracuse’s student newspaper, recently highlighted the renovations of the Alpha Chi Rho chapter house with a video tour. In 2016, a pipe burst, causing damage to the built in 1914 structure.
Photo courtesy of The Daily Orange
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Alpha Gamma Delta founder Emily H. Butterfield. was an architect and an authority on fraternity heraldry. She designed the Alpha Chapter’s home at 709 Comstock Avenue. According to the January 1931 Alpha Gamma Delta Quarterly, the home was completed in the fall of 1928. The chapter’s first two homes were rentals. The third home was purchased and “occupied until plans for the new house were executed.”
The Quarterly article gave a detailed description of the chapter’s home at 709 Comstock. The house is Georgian in design:
being of Old Virginia brick with the coping, steps and replica of the coat of arms in buff Indiana limestone. Entrance is through the heavy colonial doorway into the foyer with its high arched windows, fireplace and colorful stone floor. First to the left of the main hallway, which is two steps above the level of the foyer, is the suite of three rooms reserved for the use of the housemother. Beyond, at the right, is the arched entrance to the living room opposite the attractive stairway which leads to the second floor. The living room is spacious in its proportions and with its lovely fireplace with ceiling high built-in bookcases on either side, its creamy walls, walnut beams,oriental rugs and attractive furniture makes a charming setting for the chapter life. At one end of the living room are French doors opening into the sun porch, from which one enters the dining room through an arch. The dining room is also entered through arches from the living room and hall, which makes the entire floor wonderfully adapted for dances and other gatherings.
The dining room is furnished with extensive refectory tables and narrow-backed Windsor chairs. There is also a most attractive built-in buffet. Back of the dining room is the butler’s pantry, the up-to-date kitchen, and two maid’s rooms with bath. On the main floor there are also the coatroom and large lavatory for use at parties, the attractive guest room with its private bath, and the town girls’ room, large and airy with plenty of closet space for all sorts of belongings that may need a safe and temporary housing. The large hall on the second floor is furnished as a lounging room and from it open thirteen bedrooms, each for two girls. All of the rooms differ but each has plenty of space and light and two clothes closets, one for each occupant.
Alpha Gamma Delta, 709 Comstock Avenue
The chapter was closed in 2001 and it was recolonized nine years later. During the interim, the house was used as an all-female residence hall called Butterfield House. The chapter returned to the house after the lease with the university ended in 2011.
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Alpha Phi – A Society and Chapter House of Its Own
Founding Homes of Alpha Gamma Delta
Before 210 Walnut Place – New York Alpha of Pi Beta Phi’s Euclid House
Pi Beta Phi’s New York Alpha Chapter Before 210 Walnut Place
New York Alpha Chapter House 1911 designed by Ward Wellington Ward. It later served as a home for Zeta Beta Tau.
