“Reverting to immediately prior version; fact about Kappa Alpha Theta membeship (sic) is unsupported and a Google search suggests it refers to a different person altogether.” The subject of this wikipedia entry was Edith Schwartz Clements. She was indeed a member of Kappa Alpha Theta. I went searching for a primary source which would leave no doubt that it was she, and not another Edith Clements, who was a Theta. I found it the Kappa Alpha Theta, Vol. 22(2), January 1909, on page 164 in the report of the Minneapolis Alumnae Association: “It was our privilege in October to give a tea at the home of Mrs Birch in welcome to Edith Schwartz Clements of Rho chapter whose brilliant husband has come to head the department of botany at the university. The guests included the wives of members of the faculty and also representatives from the alumnae chapters of the other women’s fraternities.” (See http://wp.me/p20I1i-2xO for more info on Schwartz.)
I enjoy documenting the GLO connections of wikipedia subjects. I will also delete the information about a person if I come across it while searching something else. I took out the claim that Carly Simon was a member of a GLO. She isn’t. That said, I am not the wikipedia police and I am not going out searching for problems. If I come across something that needs correcting, I will correct it, but it’s not my main purpose in life.
So how did I end up here? I’m not really sure. For the past 36 hours, I have been felled by a rare summer cold, a gift from my husband, who has been battling it for a few days longer. On Wednesday, Libbie, the Pi Phi car, and her driver Daphney, joined the Southern Illinois Pi Phi Alumnae Club for lunch and a photo op. After the festivities were over, I headed to the grocery store to pick up a few things. There, in the produce section, a head cold attacked me and it was as if a faucet turned itself on. Three boxes of tissues later, two of them the lotion kind that gets saved for this purpose, I feel sort of like myself again.
There are about 30 Pi Phis in Southern Illinois. A third of them are dues paying members to the Alumnae Club and most of them attended the lunch with Libbie.
But back to wikipedia. Should anyone join a certain GLO solely because someone they admire or some famous people belonged to that organization? No, no, and a thousand times, no.
For those women signing up for Panhellenic recruitment, I give you this advice. Do not rule out any organizations solely because of what you heard from your cousin who is on another campus, or your boyfriend who is at a school that doesn’t have GLOs, or from what you read on the internet on “ranking” sites. If you’re a legacy do not think you will have automatic entry into that organization. It’s not possible in many instances. And the fact is that it might not be the best match for you. Joining an organization to please someone else isn’t the best option in most cases. You, and only you, need to be happy with your choice. The grass is always greener on the other side if you let it be. It is up to you to work for the betterment of the organization you join.
For those hoping to join organizations whose recruitment is not as structured as the Panhellenic Council recruitment, I advocate keeping an open mind and being willing to make a decision to work on behalf of that GLO. It doesn’t matter who wore the badge before you; you and your chapter members, how you behave and dedicate yourself to the organization, will be the ones who decide its future.
© Fran Becque, www.fraternityhistory.com, 2016. All Rights Reserved. If you enjoyed this post, please sign up for updates. Also follow me on twitter @GLOHistory and Pinterest www.pinterest.com/glohistory/
