The History of Sigma Phi Epsilon

(As taken from The Lifetime of Responsibility handbook.)

The Place of Our Origin

     Richmond College, where Sigma Phi Epsilon was founded in the early 20th century, was at the time attended by a mere 200 students, and perhaps between a third and a half of this number belonged to five fraternities. Kappa Alpha Order had come there in 1870, Phi Kappa Sigma in 1873, Phi Gamma Delta in 1890, Pi Kappa Alpha in 1891, and Kappa Sigma in 1898. Phi Delta Theta, Sigma Chi, and Sigma Alpha Epsilon also had established chapters there which had expired. The little Baptist college was founded in 1830, and many of its graduates became Baptist ministers.

     Most of the national fraternities, as their histories show, have been established simply because they were needed. The desire for brotherhood was in young men's souls. Sigma Phi Epsilon was founded because twelve young collegians hungered for a campus fellowship based on Judeo/Christian ideals that neither the college community nor the fraternity system at the time could offer. Sigma Phi Epsilon was needed. It was founded, moreover, because the leadership which is required for such a project asserted itself in fortunate ways.

Sigma Phi Epsilon Founded

     Carter Ashton Jenkins, the 18-year-old son of a minister, had been a student at Rutgers University, New Jersey, where he had joined Chi Phi Fraternity. When he transferred to Richmond College in the fall of 1900, he sought companions to take the place of the Chi Phi brothers he had left behind at Rutgers. During the course of the term, he found five men who had already been drawn into a bond of an informal fellowship, and he urged them to join him in applying for a charter of Phi Chi at Richmond College. They agreed, and the request for a charter was forwarded to Chi Phi only to meet with refusal because Chi Phi felt that Richmond College, as any college with less than 300 students, was too small for the establishment of a Chi Phi chapter.

     Wanting to maintain their fellowship, the six men, Jenkins, Benjamin Gaw, William Carter, William Wallace, Thomas Wright, and William Phillips, decided to form their own local fraternity. Of the six, Jenkins was the only one who really knew what a fraternity was, so the task of drawing plans for the new fraternity fell to him.

  The First Meeting

     While in the formative stages, the six original members found six others who were also searching for a campus fellowship that neither the college campus not the existing fraternity system could offer. The six new members were Lucian Cox, Richard Owens, Edgar Allen, Robert McFarland, Franklin Kerfoot, and Thomas McCaul.

     The twelve met one day in October, 1901, in Gaw and Wallace's room on the third floor of Ryland Hall to discuss organization of the Fraternity they would call "Sigma Phi." The exact date of this meeting is not known, and if any minutes were kept, they have been lost. However, the meeting was probably held before the middle of the month, because the twelve founders are named as members on November 1, 1901, in the first printed roster of the Fraternity. Jenkins is listed as the first member.

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