Women’s History Month is also a time to celebrate the National Panhellenic Conference organizations by the wearing of NPC badges on Monday, March 7. Badge day is the first Monday in March.
NPC began in 1902 with seven founding members. In its first ten years, additional groups joined in quick succession. At the 1951 meeting, the six Association of Education Sororities (AES) and five other groups received full membership. In 1957, NPC reached an all-time high of 32 members but by the next meeting in 1959, the number was reduced to 29 due to the union of several of the groups. NPC currently has 26 members. That number has been constant since 1971 when Iota Alpha Pi disbanded.
Having had my chapter of initiation close, I know what an awful feeling that is. Yet, I still can work for the organization, I can still be a part of its activities. I can read a magazine about what is going on in the collegiate and alumnae worlds. I cannot imagine what it would be like to have my organization dissolve and disappear. Did the members have any idea that the sorority leadership was planning to dissolve Iota Alpha Pi. A few months ago I heard from an Iota Alpha Pi, a 1961 initiate of the Beta Alpha Chapter at Penn State. After graduating, she went on to be an adviser to the Beta Delta Chapter at Cornell from 1966-67.
I asked her if the possibility of shutting down the organization was ever brought to the membership. She said “While I can’t speak for the Iotas who were still in college, I can tell you that nobody I know knew anything about Iota Alpha Pi being disbanded until after the fact. Many of my sorority sisters said that if they had known the sorority was in (financial?) trouble, they would have done something to help. We were all shocked when we got the news!”
A reunion of the Penn State chapter of Iota Alpha Pi
Iota Alpha Pi, the first college sorority for Jewish women, was founded in March 3, 1903 at the New York Normal College (now Hunter College). The founders were Hannah Finkelstein (Swick), Olga Edelstein (Ecker), Sadie April (Glotzer), Rose Posner (Bernstein), Rose Delson (Hirschman), May Finklestein (Spiegel), and Frances Zellermayer (Delson). Zellermayer’s brother Maurice was a founder of Zeta Tau Beta; she married Rose Delson’s brother.
It began as a local organization, J.A.P., pronounced “Jay-ay-peez.” According to a 1942 initiate interviewed by Marianne R. Sanua for her book Going Greek: Jewish College Fraternities in the United States 1895-1945, J.A.P. stood for “Just a Plain” Sorority. Sanua does not believe the name is in any way connected with the current meaning of those letters. It took on Greek letters when a second chapter was founded in 1913. The first six chapters were all in the metro New York area. These campuses were Hunter College, Brooklyn Law School, New York University, New Jersey Law School, and Adelphi College. The Eta chapter was founded in 1925 at the University of Denver. The organization went international in 1929 with the installation of the Kappa Chapter at the University of Toronto. Mu Chapter was installed at the University of Manitoba in 1932.
The back cover of The Heights
The Pi Chapter was installed at Syracuse University in 1942. In 1946, the group purchased a home at 403 Comstock Avenue, near the corner of East Adams. It had been the home Syracuse architect Albert L. Brockway designed and built for himself in 1912. It was Alpha Iota’s Pi’s home until 1972 when, after the organization disbanded. Syracuse University purchased it and it became Whitman Cottage, a small group residence for women. The building was razed in 2005.
The home of the Syracuse University chapter of Iota Phi Alpha from 1946-72. The building was razed in 2005 to make way for a parking facility. Photo courtesy of the Syracuse Post-Standard.
Its flower was the red rose and its colors were red and black. The estimated total membership in May 31, 1967 was 6,300. The badge pictured above is from the years after Iota Alpha Pi joined NPC because it has the roses on the horizontal points. They were added because the original badge looked too much like Alpha Delta Pi’s badge.
Its flower was the red rose and its colors were red and black. The estimated total membership in May 31, 1967 was 6,300. The badge pictured above is from the years after Iota Alpha Pi joined NPC because it has the roses on the horizontal points. They were added because the original badge looked too much like Alpha Delta Pi’s badge.
© 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/
