Today’s post was spurred on by a tweet from Curator of Archives @PhiGamArchives:
12/17/1860 Lambda Chapter writes other chapters to propose publishing “Phi Gamma Delta Monthly.” #badtiming #CivilWar
Bad timing indeed! First off, writing letters took time. The Lambda chapter at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana (although in 1860, it was still Indiana Asbury University) had about a dozen letters to write. Hopefully, they had current addresses for the other chapters. The fraternity had published a catalog of membership in 1856, so perhaps that provided some direction on contacting the other chapters. Waiting for replies took even longer.
April 12, 1861, marked the start of the Civil War, a war which wreaked havoc on the American college fraternity system. College men left higher education to take up arms. One of the unintended consequences of the Civil War was that many of the institutions of higher education found it necessary to admit women in order to keep the institutions open. The money derived from admitting women was the same currency that the men paid, and it all helped to pay the bills.
It took 19 years for the first issue of the Phi Gamma Delta to be published. The chapter at Ohio Wesleyan made it a reality. For three years, it was known as the Phi Gamma Delta Quarterly and then in 1889, it became The Phi Gamma Delta.
The first fraternity magazine, Βηθα Θηθα Πι, belonging to the fraternity of the same name, made its debut on December 15, 1872. The Scroll of Phi Delta Theta has been published continuously since 1875, making it the second oldest.
In the 20th edition of Baird’s Manual of American College Fraternities (1991), in the Alpha Sigma Phi listing, it is noted “The Tomahawk is the Fraternity’s quarterly national magazine and it is the oldest fraternity publication still in existence today since its founding in 1847.” The publication which debuted in 1845 was The Yale Tomahawk, the forerunner of Alpha Sigma Phi’s fraternity magazine. Alpha Sigma Phi was founded in 1845 at Yale. The Tomahawk was the chapter newsletter, published in part, to fuel a rivalry with Kappa Sigma Theta’s The Yale Banger. In 1852, The Tomahawk editors were expelled after violating faculty orders to cease publication. Volume 6 of The Tomahawk was published in 1909-10, so it is my guess that the magazine has not been printed continuously since 1847.
© Fran Becque, www.fraternityhistory.com, 2013. All Rights Reserved.
