Page:BairdsmanualofAmericancollegefrate8.pdf/81



HIS fraternity has twice changed its character and its present form of organization dates from June, 1907. Originally it was a sophomore society organized at Yale in 1846 by George Benedict, Levi B. Bradley, William B. Clark, E. Foote Hall, Albert Hobson, Henry H. Hill, William B. Lee, Coorydon C. Merriman, Benjamin F. Moore, Washington Murray, Edward Scofield, William W. Ward, Erastus H. Weiser and Silas Wodell, all of the class of 1849. Under the peculiar system of societies then existing at Yale, there were separate societies for freshmen, sophomores, juniors and seniors, the numbers passing from one to the other as they advanced from class to class. At that time the chapters of Alpha Delta Phi, Psi Upsilon and Delta Kappa Epsilon were junior societies and of the founders of Alpha Sigma Phi, Messrs. Bradley, Hobson, Hill, Merriman, Murray and Wodell joined Delta Kappa Epsilon; Clark, Hall, Lee and Ward joined Psi Upsilon and Weiser joined Alpha Delta Phi in their junior year.

The Alpha Sigma Phi was then the rival of a similar sophomore society called Kappa Sigma Theta. This latter died at Yale in 1858 and Alpha Sigma Phi in 1864. They both issued annual "feuilletons" or printed attacks