Kappa Kappa Psi - Alpha Chapter

Oklahoma State University

Serving the OSU Bands and Striving for the Highest Since 1919

History Snippets

Snippet #20 - "Washington Alpha Chapter", taken from the first issue of The Baton.

Steve Nelson:  "The following is taken from the very first issue of The Baton in 1921.  It recounts the first page of the first petitioning document received by Kappa Kappa Psi.

    You'll note that Gamma chapter is referred to as Washington Alpha Chapter.  This nomenclature was used very briefly in the very beginning but was soon replaced by the much less confusing method that we use today."

WASHINGTON ALPHA CHAPTER
Washington State University, Seattle

First Petition to Kappa Kappa Psi, from Washington State University, Seattle, Washington

May 26, 1920

Kappa Kappa Psi,
Honorary Musical Fraternity,
Oklahoma State College,
Stillwater, Oklahoma

Greetings:

    We the undersigned members of the R. O. T. C. Band of the University of Washington, having joined ourselves into an organization for the purpose of promoting the interest of band work among college men and bettering our own mother organization, believing that such things can be better accomplished thru an organization of this kind, and further having investigated the standards set forth by Kappa Kappa Psi, hereby formally petition you for a chapter of Kappa Kappa Psi, to be installed at the University of Washington.

    If this petition is favorably accepted, we promise to uphold and maintain the standards of the fraternity and to do all in our power to carry forward the grand work that the organization has started.

    Signed - Joseph W. Hicks, Robert H. Stewart, Walter A. Nelson, Thomas O'Neil, Walter Kohagen, Peter Odegard, Merritt Newdall, Glen E. Morse, Edwin W. Benson, Gerald J. Heacock, John Mickelson.

+ + +

    The foregoing is a duplicate of the first page of the first petition received by the Kappa Kappa Psi Fraternity.  Washington State University rightly boasts of the largest and best University Band on the Pacific Coast, and one of the few best of the United States.

    Although our Chapter at Washington State University is recorded as chapter number three, they will always hold the honor of being the first chapter to be granted a charter by Kappa Kappa Psi, although they were officially installed after our chapter at Montana State College.