Elihu (secret Society) - Tap Histories

Tap Histories

From its earliest days, the society has favored those who leaned toward literary pursuits, acting, teaching, and the law. Elihu Society's taps among the Yale class of 1914, for instance, included Rufus King, president of the Yale Dramatic Association and Newbold Noyes, Sr., chairman of the Yale Literary Magazine and later publisher of the Washington Evening Star newspaper.

In a March 2000 essay on Yale's societies in Salon.com, Jacques Leslie, a Jew from a Democratic family in California, recalled learning he would be tapped for Skull and Bones. "I was leaning towards Elihu," wrote Leslie, who later became a journalist and author, "the sole above-ground society that was headquartered in an actual frame house with windows." When the Bonesmen arrived to tap Leslie, he shouted "Reject!" The surprised expression on the Bonesman's face was printed on the following day's New York Times second front page. "Skull was first," noted The Times in its caption, "but he chose Elihu."

Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman was also courted by Skull and Bones, despite the fact that he wrote editorials critical of the society in the Yale Daily News. "Heresy of all heresies," Lieberman wrote in The News, "it would be wonderful if, as a symbolic gesture, the societies some day put windows in their buildings. No other institution seems to separate the haves from the have-nots so forcefully in the eyes of students." But Skull and Bones chose to ignore Lieberman's complaints and tapped him anyway. Lieberman rejected Bones in favor of Elihu. "It was too old Yalie," Lieberman told a friend about Bones. "Instead," noted The Los Angeles Times, Lieberman "joined the Elihu Society, a more intellectual club."

The political journalist Jacob Weisberg, formerly editor of Slate, was similarly offered membership in Skull and Bones by Senator John Kerry. Weisberg declined, citing Bones' exclusion of women. Shortly afterwards Weisberg was persuaded by The Washington Post's Robert G. Kaiser to join Elihu instead.

Elihu tapped as a member for the delegation of 1932, in the depth of The Great Depression, a small-town Tennessee boy strapped for cash who was grateful for the $1,000 he received as senior aide of Pierson College as it covered half the year's outlay for college. The student, John Templeton, went on to a career as pioneer of international investing, founder of one of the nation's largest mutual fund companies, and patron of a philanthropic enterprise, now run by his son, also an Elihu member. Templeton was knighted by the Queen.

While Sir John Templeton used his fortune to endow a foundation devoted to Christian thought, other Elihu members had a different take on their Elihu experience. Paul Monette, an author and gay rights activist, who portrayed himself to fellow delegation members as a depressive rather than actively gay, became, following his graduation, a prominent author and spokesman for the gay community.

Elihu membership has included journalists, authors, academics, independent and documentary filmmakers, U.S. Ambassadors, government officials, urban planners, artists, members of Congress, social activists, governors, actors, a Chairman of U.S. Federal Reserve, pop singers, medical doctors, architects, United Nations officials, environmental lawyers, United States Senators, composers, including David Shire and Maury Yeston,businessmen, foundation executives, environmentalists and others.