I am knee-deep in the 1880s researching an upcoming talk. I’m going through an 1887 Arrow of Pi Beta Phi which has the organization’s first directory of members included in it. My mind is wandering to all corners of the earth.
Some of the names I am looking for are in the listing for Illinois Alpha at Monmouth College, even though the chapter, along with the other Greek-letter organizations at the college, was forced to close by college authorities. One member of the class of 1884 resided in Sparta, Illinois. Sparta is about 45 minutes from where I live. I can only imagine how long it took to get to Monmouth, today a good four+ hours drive at 70 mph, back in the 1880s. Sparta has many wonderful old homes. Did she live in one of them?
One of Pi Beta Phi’s founders, Jennie Horne Turnbull, was living in Argyle, New York, very close to the Vermont border. I knew she later lived in the Philadelphia area, but I didn’t know she spent some time in upstate New York. Her great-granddaughter is a Pi Phi and is a chapter sister of a very good friend of mine. I wonder if the family knows why Jennie lived in Argyle.
The Lombard College chapter has alumnae as far east as N. Montpelier, Vermont, and Camden, Maine, and as far west as Santa Cruz and Passadena (sic), California. All are very far from Galesburg, Illinois, where Lombard College, founding site of Alpha Xi Delta, was located. Are those their hometowns, where they spent their childhoods, or did they merely end up in those locales after college, and perhaps marriage?
In the Carthage College chapter listing, I find Minnie McDill. It was before she married Thomas Hanna McMichael. He served as President of Monmouth College. Minnie was instrumental in bringing the Greek-letter organizations back to Monmouth College. She spearheaded the reestablishment of the Pi Beta Phi chapter after she and her husband accompanied Clara Brownlee Hutchinson, a founder, to the 1927 Pequot convention to plead the case of Zeta Epsilon Chi, the local organization which hoped to bring the Pi Phi charter back to Monmouth. Minnie died a short time after she coordinated the installation festivities. We have letters Minnie wrote to Grand President, Amy Burnham Onken, who though short of stature, was a most formidable figure. Minnie wants to install the chapter as quickly as possible; Miss Onken, as she was called, wants to take some time to plan things. My money would have been on Miss Onken to win out. However, Minnie was the victor. I wonder if she knew that her time was almost up and she was bound and determined to see that Illinois Alpha back on campus before she passed on.
Evelyn Peters Kyle, a member of the Illinois Alpha Chapter of Pi Beta Phi at Monmouth College. Her grandmother, Mollie Duryea Sage, was a member of Pi Phi’s third chapter at Mount Pleasant Seminary.
The Iowa Wesleyan College chapter listing was the only one to include the degrees earned by its members. I spy my dear departed friend Evelyn Peters Kyle’s grandmother among the members. Her grandmother was part of our third chapter, the one at Mount Pleasant Seminary. When the chapter closed, the alumnae were included in with the Iowa Wesleyan alumnae for some long forgotten reason.
Another Iowa Wesleyan alumna is in Baxter Springs, I.T. That must be “Indian Territory” (I find Baxter Springs, Kansas, in a quick google search). One alumna has a Ph.D. There are M.S. and M.D. after another Iowa Wesleyan name. I want to find out more about the medical doctor so I google her. In 1892, she died of pneumonia on my birthday.
Anna Lawson’s address is Barielly, India; her Iowa Wesleyan classmate Hattie Gassner Torrance is listed as living in Teheren (sic), Persia. A Simpson College Pi Phi is listed in Shatahapore (sic), India. Today, an Iowan could probably get to any of those places in a day or two. I can only imagine the trek in the 1880s when the primary way to coordinate plans on the other side of the world was through pen, paper, envelope, and stamp topped with a healthy dose of patience.
Carrie Lane Chapman is among the Iowa State University Pi Phis. She is listed as living in San Francisco. There she become a widow for the first time. She would soon marry George Catt.
The listing for the University of Kansas chapter includes Gertrude Boughton Blackwelder, class of 1875. She would later be one of the speakers at the 1893 Fraternity Day at the Chicago World’s Fair (see http://wp.me/p20I1i-hk).
Hattie Ritz, a member of the University of Denver chapter, lists her hometown as Walla Walla, W.T. The W.T. must mean Washington Territory because Washington did not become a state until 1889.
The chapter at Hillsdale College was then the youngest on the fraternity roll. Nine members, the ones whose names are on the charter, are listed. Two of them, Belle Armstrong and Myra Brown, not seemingly biological sisters, are from Newark, Illinois, west of Chicago in rural northern Illinois. Did they travel together to college? Did they consult each other on the decision to attend Hillsdale, or did they do so independently? Inquiring minds want to know! I had to search for my copy of the history my friend Penny Proctor wrote on the occasion of Michigan Alpha’s 125th anniversary in 2012. I knew where the book was, but I spent a good five minutes staring at the shelf before it jumped out at me. From Penny’s research, it seems that Belle and Myra did not return from Newark for the following year’s studies. I really should go to my collection of subsequent Pi Phi directories and see if I can uncover what became of Belle and Myra. My curiosity is piqued, but today’s to-do list prohibits me from going there. (Alas, Penny has come to my rescue, “the Browns sent 3 daughters to Hillsdale, one of whom was a good friend of Belle Armstrong. Myra didn’t return due to failing health, and she died in 1900, but in 1898 she wrote the chapter apologizing that she could no longer afford to pay $1 for her subscription to The Arrow! Belle taught school until she married, and eventually moved to Cedar Rapids, where she became a member of the alumnae club.”)
What should have been a quick, look it up, get out of there, research foray turned into a few hours scanning pages and making connections. As you may surmise, it is one of my favorite ways to waste time. And if you’ve made it to this paragraph, you’ve wasted some time, too, reading about it. My heartfelt gratitude to you!
(c) Fran Becque, www.fraternityhistory.com, 2014. 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/
My favorite way to “waste” time, too! I think the point the struck me the most was “I.T.” (Indian Territory). We are such a young nation and sometimes we forget. What pioneers (in more ways than one) our IC sisters were!