Fraternity History & More

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.

For the last few months, I have been writing a history of the Phi Kappa Psi chapter at the University of Illinois. It’s always fun to discover interesting facts about an organization. The quest to establish a Phi Psi chapter at the University of Illinois was led by Dan G. Swannell. The son of a Champaign businessman, Swannell spent a year at the University of Illinois before heading off to Ann Arbor, Michigan. There he became a member of the Michigan Alpha chapter of Phi Kappa Psi. When his father became ill and he returned to Champaign he was keenly interested in having Phi Psi establish a chapter on campus. Swannell’s efforts and steadfastness of purpose not only saw the Illinois Delta chapter of Phi Kappa Psi receive a charter in 1904 , but he helped the chapter build its own home less than five years after it was established. That home at 911 S. 4th Street at the corner of Chalmers is still the fraternity’s home. The chapter has remained in that home since it was built by A.W. Stoolman, except for the years the war department took over the house as a residence for soldiers in training and a year it was rented out as a boarding house for women before the men returned from war service (the few Phi Psis who were on campus then lived with other fraternity men in the Phi Kappa Tau house). Swannell was known as the “Father of Illinois Delta.” He went on to serve as Phi Psi’s National President and he was instrumental in establishing the fraternity’s Endowment Fund.

However, it’s the Williams brothers I want to showcase. Most Phi Psis have heard of two of the brothers, Howard Chandler “Army” Williams and Clarence Foss “Dab” Williams. “Army” started his Phi Psi life as a member of the New Hampshire Alpha chapter at Dartmouth. He became a charter member of Illinois Delta. “Dab” was the next Williams brother to sign the chapter roll. “Army” went on to serve as National President of Phi Kappa Psi, the first of three to come from the chapter. As a student in 1910, “Dab” along with an Acacia buddy, W. Elmer Ekblaw, co-founded the tradition of Homecoming; it was an idea which spread like wildfire throughout the college landscape, helped along, I believe, by the Greek-letter press. “Dab”  would later go on to be “Mr. Phi Psi,” as Shield Editor and Phi Psi’s Executive Secretary/Director.

Lloyd Garrison Williams was initiated in 1908. He and his brothers grew up in Elgin, Illinois, where their father was a probate judge. After graduation, he went back to Elgin and began practicing law. In 1914, he was appointed the city’s attorney. In May 1917, he entered the U.S. Army. The Shield of Phi Kappa Psi gives this account of his service:

He entered the service in May 1917 in the first officers’ training camp at Fort Sheridan, receiving his commission as second lieutenant the following August. Almost immediately he received orders to embark, and arrived in France late in September. He was assigned to English and French sectors at different times for further training, specializing in trench mortar work. He then served with the 116th U. S. infantry in the Toul sector and later in the motor transport service. Early in October, at his own urgent request, he was transferred to the first division of regulars, being assigned to company K, 28th infantry. He saw ten straight days of the most severe fighting in the Argonne forest. It was after these engagements that Lieutenant Williams received his citation for bravery and recommendation for promotion. 

Lieutenant Lloyd G. Williams died at Base Hospital 34 in Nantes, France on November 26, 1917. His family in Illinois received a letter dated November 24, 1917, written by an Army nurse; in it she wrote that Lloyd was in the hospital. According to The Shield article, “The family exhausted every means to get further information, but with no success until the receipt of the message, on January 22d, announcing his death nearly two months previously.” The cause of death was bronchial pneumonia and cerebral meningitis.

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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, 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/