"Highest in Brotherhood, Greatest Ever Known"
Phi Kappa National Fraternity
The Founding
The founding of Phi Kappa is sated in mystery. The founding date has been set at February 3, 1900 at Southern University Preparatory School, but we may have been founded at an even earlier date. During our early, years at Southern we operated under very subrosa conditions, though college fraternities were permitted in the University.
What
we do know about our earliest history surrounds
the
personality of Jacob Broughton Nelson.
From an early age he lived with
his aunt and uncle, a circuit
minister for the
Methodist Church. In the years 1914-1916
Nelson attended the Southern University Preparatory School, a Methodist
institution in Greensboro, Alabama. Nelson was a member of the Glee Club
there. In 1918, the college and prep school closed down in Greensboro and merged with
Birmingham College, forming Birmingham-Southern University.
Due to the subrosa condition of Alpha Chapter at Southern, Nelson has been proclaimed the titular founder of Phi Kappa. He has been described as being an ambitious and popular young fellow who was about 5'6" tall with brown hair, a medium build, and who wore round, wire-rimmed glasses.
In 1916, Jack Oscar Hain of Selma, Alabama attended Southern where he roomed with Nelson. This started a friendship that would greatly effect the spread of Phi Kappa throughout the South.
The Founding
(1900-1916)
The Early Years
(1916-1922)
Vital Expansion
(1922-1941)
The War Years
(1942-1946)
More Battles
(1947-1957)
The Golden Era
(1957-1960)
The Sixties
(1961-1969)
The Prosperous
Years
(1970-1974)
The Diamond
Anniversary
(1975-1979)
The Decade of
Determination
(1980-1989)
The Nineties
(1990-1997)
Covington and After
(1998-2002)
A New Attitude
(2003-the future)
The History
of Phi Kappa National Fraternity
By: Robert L. Pugh &
Frank Liddell (1900-1970)
Patrick D. Thrash (1970-1985)
William Kyle Ingle (1985-1993)
Gerald Everett and Brent McCarty (1993-2004)