University of Virginia Library

XLI. Student Life—Social Side

Throughout the Ninth Period, 1904–19, the town
of Charlottesville continued to be too limited in popuulation
to swallow up the University socially, or even
from that point of view to influence it to any sensible
extent. The evolution of the University community
had, during this interval, gone forward along lines
peculiar to itself, with as little modification or expansion,
through pressure from the outside, as had been perceptible
during the earlier periods. What was the most
important alteration which the progress of time had
brought to the social life of the students from the operation
of those subtle influences which had arisen from
their own ranks? In former years, as we have seen,
every matriculate stood upon a footing that was not in
the slightest degree affected by the length of his association
with the institution. The collegian who had only
recently been admitted for the first time occupied a
social position equal in every general respect to that of
his contemporary who had returned for his second or
third or even sixth year. All were sons of the University
of Virginia, and as such were not separated by a

hedge of sentimental discriminations springing from
length of stay or from class division. One student
might be more industrious and more acquisitive than another,
or more brilliant in intellect or more winning in
manner. These were real distinctions which had always
existed, but, formerly, no artificial ones were superimposed
upon them to make the social gulf between individual
and individual wider than nature had intended.

During the Ninth Period, there arose a hypercritical
attitude among the students who had passed their
initial session, which tended to deprive the first-year
matriculate of that equality of social standing which he
had always possessed in former times. "What is the
justification for the coolness at the University of Virginia
towards new men?" asked an observer in
1905–06. "Why should the old men receive the new
men with so much aloofness? The new man enters a
self-governing student body, and gradually learns what
is desired of him, and learns to conform to it. A man
can wear any hat he chooses; but there are things he
cannot do; and this is enforced by the attitude of the old
men." Possibly, this jealous posture towards the first-year
student had its incitement in that steady increase in
the number of first-year matriculates which became so
noticeable with the progress of the Ninth Period. Unless
some frankly restrictive influence was brought to
bear, would there not be danger that the power of these
swarming first-year men could not be restrained; and
that, in their rawness, they might be inclined to treat
the spirit of the old college social traditions with silent
neglect, if not with open contempt?

But, however much disposed the young men who had
passed their first year might be sternly to teach their supposed
place to those who had recently entered, it was not

for a moment forgotten by them that it was from the
group of matriculates in their first session that the
fraternities and societies and clubs were to be recruited.
It was this fact which moderated the superior, if not
supercilious, bearing of the older men, who were anxious
to fill up the gaps which, from year to year, existed
in the ranks of those associations at the beginning of
every autumn. And new associations were being constantly
formed, which made the draft upon the new
students all the more important. "When," asked the
editors of College Topics, in 1905, "will this increase
in the number of the University fraternities stop?" At
this time, about eighteen of the foremost organizations
of that type in the United States were represented at the
University of Virginia. Among those which established
chapters there after 1904 were the Phi Rho Sigma,
Theta Nu Epsilon, Phi Sigma Kappa, Sigma Phi Epsilon
Alpha Chi Rho, Delta Phi, Delta Chi, Theta Chi,
Zeta Beta Tau, and Phi Epsilon Pi.

In our history of anterior periods, we described the
general social character of the fraternities taken as a
body. It will not be necessary to add to this description
in our account of the Ninth Period, as time brought
no salient alterations in their tendencies. There are
other features, however, which have a high degree of interest
of their own. Of the forty-five hundred members
of the academic department enrolled between 1905 and
1917, twenty-one hundred belonged to the associations
which were distinctly fraternal. This proportion represented
less than one-half of the entire number. Of
the twenty-seven hundred and forty-nine young men
registered in the law department, eighteen hundred and
sixty-six had belonged to these associations also. This
indicated that twice as many of the students of that department

had been enrolled in the fraternities as had
not been enrolled. In the department of medicine, there
were seven hundred and ninety-three who had been members,
and four hundred and fifty-three who had not been;
in the engineering department, the corresponding figures
were five hundred and ninety-seven and six hundred
and seventy-five. It was only in this particular department
that the students who had not been members exceeded
in number those who had been. In all the departments,
taken as a whole, there were, during this
long interval, 5358 who had been members, and 4475
who had not been members, of the fraternal associations
of all kinds. In this list, the membership of the
civic clubs, musical clubs, German clubs, athletic clubs,
State, city, and school clubs, and debating societies, has
not been counted.

In 1911, an inter-fraternity agreement was drawn up
which required that no association of that character
should directly or indirectly go so far as to invite a first-year
student to become a member of it until after the
fifteenth of January. When nine o'clock of the evening
of that day had passed, such an invitation could be
delivered; but it must be drafted in writing and accompanied
by the request that the answer should be delayed
forty-eight hours. Eighteen fraternities adopted this
rule; but before a year had gone by, that rule had been
substantially modified,—it was then provided that, between
midnight of October 14 and midnight of October
19, fraternity claims could be discussed with a prospective
member; and that, after that hour of the latter day,
a private invitation in writing could be mailed to him,
but with the information that he could, if he wished,
defer his reply until two o'clock in the afternoon
of October 29. This extremely formal arrangement

proved unsatisfactory: first, because at least four fraternities
had refused to become parties to the agreement,
—a fact which gave them an open field; and secondly,
because the competition which followed was
thought to be more detrimental to the kindly intercourse
of the fraternities than the old custom which permitted
all to seek as they pleased.

In 1908, the Board of Visitors offered to lease a site
on the University grounds to the Kappa Sigma for the
erection of a fraternity-house, and to loan them the sum
of $12,000 for its construction. It was not until March
apparently that this association was ready to accept this
advance,—permission was then also given to the members
of both the Sigma Chi and the Delta Tau Delta to
build. The Kappa Alpha, the Phi Delta Theta, and the
Sigma Chi took possession of new homes after 1908–09.
The house belonging to the Phi Delta Theta was situated
on Rugby Road, while the one belonging to the
Sigma Chi was situated in University Place. The Chi
Phi occupied a bungalow in Madison Lane. The Beta
Theta Pi acquired new quarters on Preston Heights, the
Delta Phi and Sigma Phi Epsilon, in Chancellor Street,
and the Sigma Alpha Epsilon in Fourteenth Street.
The house of the Phi Kappa Sigma, standing in Madison
Lane, had cost nearly nineteen thousand dollars,
while the houses of the Kappa Sigma and the Delta Tau
Delta,—both situated on Carr's Hill,—had each been
erected at an outlay of twenty thousand.

In December, 1912, the proposal to construct a road
around the north-west side of this hill was approved by
the Board, in the expectation that it would create room
for new fraternity homes. The Delta Kappa Epsilon
took advantage of the completion of the work to build
a house for its own members on the line of this new

public way. The Phi Kappa Psi established a home in
University Place, and the Pi Kappa Alpha and the
Alpha Tau Omega respectively on Rugby Road. There
were few fraternities in the University which had not, by
1916, either erected, purchased, or rented a spacious
and well situated house either within the precincts or in
the vicinage. This was the result chiefly of a desire on
their part to draw the personal relations of their members
closer together than had been possible when those
members resided in dormitories at a distance from each
other, and came together only occasionally. The new
homes also possessed all the modern conveniences and
comforts. It was thought that the fraternities, in
their enjoyment of all these new advantages, had encouraged
rather than discouraged a more sociable feeling
among the students; nor had their existence fostered
any bad feeling between the members and non-members
of such associations,—indeed, there were too many
members in the aggregate to raise the supposition that a
rigid policy of selection had been followed; and in addition,
it was generally known that there were many
desirable young men in the University who had declined
the invitations to join these associations.

What was the standing of the fraternities in the province
of scholarship? In 1910–11, the highest grade
attained, namely, eighty-one, was attained by the Sigma
Chi; and in 1911–12, the highest, namely, 84.6, was attained
by the Delta Psi. The lowest grade reached by
any fraternity during this session was 69.7. Nine of the
twenty-three fraternities in existence at this time attained
grades that ranged between 84.6 and 80.1, and
thirteen, between 80.1 and 70. One fraternity alone
fell below the last figure. In 1912–13, the highest
grade reached, namely, 84.9, was reached by the Delta

Tau Delta; the lowest reached was 70.2. In 1913–14,
the highest grade attained, namely, 87.6, was attained
by the Kappa Alpha; the lowest grade attained was 76.
In 1914–15, the Delta Chi led with a grade of 86, while
the lowest reached was 74.5. In 1914–15, Zeta Beta
Tau led with a grade of 87.7, followed at the lowest
point by another fraternity with a grade of 75.4.
Twenty of these associations, during this session, attained
grades that ranged between 87.7 and 80.7. The
following table records the grades of students who
were members of the fraternities as compared with the
grades of those who were not members:

Fraternity Grade Average

           

Departments	1910–11	1911–12	1913–14	1914–15	1915–16
College	67.6	73.5	78.2	80.3	78.
Graduate	79.5	84.3	86.3	85.7	87.5
Law	78.8	82.9	84.3	84.6	85.2
Medicine	82.9	64.9	77.7	75.2	77.
Engineering	72.6	70.7	82.5	88.4	87.8

Non Fraternity Grade Average

           

Departments	1910–11	1911–12	1913–14	1914–15	1915–16
College	68.5	77.2	80.1	81.4	80.6
Graduate	74.5	86.	84.7	87.1	87.4
Law	84.5	86.1	84.3	84.8	85.7
Medicine	82.9	83.3	76.3	77.8	84.5
Engineering	72.7	75.3	84.8	86.8	86.4

The most conspicuous ribbon societies, during the
Ninth Period, were still the Eli Banana, the Tilka, and
the Zeta. In 1904–05, the Eli Banana counted a membership
of twenty; and that number continued to increase
until, by 1917, it had grown to thirty-three. The
corresponding membership of Tilka was twenty-seven
and twenty-nine, while that of the others did not vary
materially during this interval. A critic of these societies

asserted, with some acerbity, in 1913, that "they
denoted class." "Whenever an exponent of these
beaumonders is discovered," he continued, "he is placarded
with a cloth decoration. The ribbon societies
include many leaders in college life, especially those
who can scintillate at a pink tea or go through a ten
course dinner without missing the right fork. No
athlete, however great, without a touch of fashion, can
get in. Fame even is not an open sesame."

From this slightly sour comment, it is to be inferred
that the ribbon societies had jealously maintained their
original exclusiveness. The germans were still controlled
by them; and they were predominant in all the
elections for officers of the General Athletic Association.
Their grasping spirit quite naturally aroused a feeling
of bitterness beyond the pale of their own coteries. It
was pointed out, in reproach to them, that, at Yale, the
highest honor was membership in one of the seven societies.
Did these societies content themselves with admitting
to their circle only social favorities? No.
Their members were elected because they were already
captains of the teams, the foremost scholars of the
classes, the successful editors, the most skilful debaters,
—in short, the men whose standing was broadly based
on the reasonable esteem of the entire body of students,
and not on the trivial partiality of a few persons banded
together in secret organizations. At the University of
Virginia, in consequence of the preponderance of these
private associations, the class presidents, the debaters.
the orators, and the editors were described as "mere
incidentals in college." "Why," asked one critic, "has
the assistant managership of our athletic teams been almost
invariably awarded to ribbon men, and the application
of others, better fitted, been turned down? The

answer is, that, so great a hold have the ribbon societies
in college, the advisory board every year is made up,
almost without exception, of ribbon men."

About 1906, Morgan P. Robinson, in the spirit of a
Roman tribune, warmly advocated the recovery by the
student body of the political honors which really belonged
to them alone; and he also suggested the adoption
of a smaller fee for admission to the athletic games.
The ribbon societies consented to the reduction of the
fee, but seem to have scotched the other purposes of
the movement. The fight was renewed in 1907, but
without success. The ticket that was then defeated had
been nominated by a caucus which represented the students
in general, in opposition to the ambitious interests
of the fraternities and societies. The ribbon societies
especially were stigmatized by their enemies as political
organizations of a distinctly ruthless type.