Alpha Chi Alpha - House History

House History

The house was begun in March 1917, when twelve Dartmouth men founded the Epsilon Kappa Alpha fraternity. In 1919, this lodge became the Phi Nu chapter of the national fraternity, Alpha Chi Rho. The house was located in the back of the present White Church.

Alpha Chi Rho flourished at Dartmouth for about ten years. In the early 1930s, however, the number of brothers declined drastically due to a number of new fraternities on campus and general financial difficulties caused by the Depression. It was at that time when Alpha Chi Rho, along with Lambda Chi Alpha, Phi Kappa Sigma, and Alpha Sigma Phi, who were each having difficulties of their own, joined together to create a new fraternity, Gamma Delta Chi. This house is still active today.

On March 9, 1957, twenty-four undergraduates bonded together and broke away from Gamma Delta Chi, which they thought was inadequate and misdirected. They reactivated the Phi Nu chapter of Alpha Chi Rho. The brotherhood moved to the present house on Webster Avenue, bought and repaired by the College. In this way, the fraternity was established. Tim Ryerson '59 was the first President of the reactivated chapter.

Early in the spring of 1963, a committee met and recommended a break from the national. On May 21, 1963, the chapter voted to discontinue their ties with the national affiliation. It was determined that the brotherhood had no meaningful ties with the national. The national chapter required brothers to "accept Jesus as their lord and savior," a tenet that brothers at the Dartmouth chapter strongly disagreed with. The ritual was meaningless to the brothers because of their general dislike for the national, and because they found such a requirement to be ridiculous. An overburdening financial obligation to the national may have been an additional consideration. The brotherhood voted to name the disaffiliated fraternity Alpha Chi Alpha and it has been in continual operation ever since.