Phi Kappa Psi was founded on February 19, 1852 in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, at Jefferson College (now Washington and Jefferson College in Washington, Pennsylvania). Phi Kappa Psi’s founders are William Henry Letterman and Charles Page Thomas Moore.
In the time I have been on twitter (@GLOHistory), I have come to learn much about Phi Kappa Psi. Mike McCoy, the fraternity’s historian (@PhiPsiArchives), does an excellent job of tweeting about the fraternity’s history. In debating about whether I could even pull off of an interesting Phi Psi Founders’ Day post, I went to Phi Psi’s website. There I made the most startling discovery, Phi Kappa Psi’s headquarters, a former mansion, also doubles as an award-winning wedding and special events venue. How many Greek-letter organizations can make that claim?
Phi Psi’s Laurel Hall and Ruth Lilly Conference Center was acquired by the Phi Kappa Psi Foundation in 2005. It had been built almost 90 years before as a private residence for Indiana banker, Stoughton J. Fletcher. At the time, it cost $2,100,000 to build. By 1920, the Fletcher American National Bank was Indiana’s largest national bank.
In the early 1920s, Fletcher’s fortune’s changed due to an ill-timed investment in armaments and a World War which ended sooner than Fletcher anticipated. He lost the bank and then his wife took her own life. In 1924, Fletcher declared bankruptcy (he died in 1957 in California, where he had worked as an elevator operator). The Fletcher American National Bank, sans Fletcher at the helm, became the owner of Laurel Hall. A year later it was sold to the Sisters of Providence. They used it to house Ladywood, an all-girls Catholic boarding school.
In 1963, the Sisters opened a new building, increasing the school’s capacity to 600 students. Unfortunately, enrollment never reached that number and by 1970 it became necessary for the school to merge with St. Agnes School. That move didn’t help. In 1974, Laurel Hall was sold to a local businessman. He developed much of the property into condominiums. Laurel Hall took on the role of the “Manor House,” the community’s office and entertainment center. In 1982, Laurel Hall was again owned by a bank.
In 1984, the Hudson Institute, a policy research organization, purchased the property and changed the name of the building to the Herman Kahn Center. For 20 years, Laurel Hall was home to the Hudson Institute. In 2004, the decision was made to move the Institute to Washington, D.C.
In 1977, Phi Psi moved its headquarters from a Cleveland, Ohio, office building to Heritage Hall in downtown Indianapolis’ Lockerbie district. For several years, the fraternity had been talking about moving to larger quarters and when the chance to move to Laurel Hall presented itself, the opportunity was quickly taken. Laurel Hall, and the six acres upon which it sits, was purchased by the Phi Kappa Psi Foundation in May 2005. The decision to buy the property seems to have been made rather quickly, as the web-site notes that the foundation acquired “a new headquarters and educational center in only 48 hours.”
Laurel Hall, 1917, photo courtesy of the Indiana Historical-Society
Laurel Hall, today, as it likely looks like that on this very day for it has been a snowy winter for Indiana.
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February 19 is also Founders’ Day for La Unidad Latina, Lambda Upsilon Lambda Fraternity, Incorporated, a fraternity for Latino students. It was founded at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York on February 19, 1982, by 11 undergraduate men, a faculty advisor, and a Cornell administrator. The majority of the founding members were in pre-med and engineering majors and they had little free time to devote to creating a fraternity of their own. But create it they did; in the ensuing 32 years, the fraternity has grown to more than 55 undergraduate chapters and more than a dozen alumni chapters. Happy Founders’ Day!
© Fran Becque, www.fraternityhistory.com, 2014. All Rights Reserved.
