Alpha Theta

Biography

Alpha Theta is a gender-inclusive Greek house at Dartmouth College. Alpha Theta was founded as a local fraternity named Iota Sigma Upsilon on March 3, 1920, by a group of seven students. In 1921 the fraternity received a charter as the Alpha Theta chapter of Theta Chi. John Sloan Dickey, later president of the college, joined the fraternity in 1928 and was elected house president only two weeks later, while still a pledge.

Nine brothers of Alpha Theta chapter of Theta Chi died in a tragic accident on the morning of Sunday, February 25, 1934, when the metal chimney of the building's old coal furnace blew out in the night and the residence filled with poisonous carbon monoxide gas.

Alpha Theta was one of the first collegiate fraternities in the United States to break from its national organization over civil rights issues, and the first at the Greek-dominated Dartmouth College. In 1951, while Dickey served as president of the college, the student body passed a resolution calling on all fraternities to eliminate racial discrimination from their constitutions.

Alpha Theta was one of the first all-male fraternities to admit female members.

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