Page 13 - 1917 November - To Dragma
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22 TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI TO DRAG MA OF ALPHA OMICRON PI 23
friends, alumnae, and even my very own Sigma freshman of ten years COMPLETENESS
ago.
Autumn is come. Nature takes leave of her darling fancies of
After the guests were gone, with the aid of Ruth Fosdick, Eloise
Fleming, Eugenia Garra.t, and Ethel Kraus, I installed the Puget summer. Why not I of You?
Sound Alumna; Chapter—two from our Mother Alpha, Fannibelle
Brown and Helen Shipman; one from Sigma, Grace Batz Guyles; Every vagrant breeze scatters flaming leaves about me, murmur-
and seven from Upsilon, Beryl Dill, Esther Fleming, Laura Hurd,
Cornelia Jenner, Ada Kraus (Pat), Minnie Kraus, and Virginia ing: "Farewell!" The bravest flower in my garden droops on a
Moseley. There! You have the statistics. The chapter held its
first meeting there and Virginia Moseley was elected president and frosted stalk and the birds have gone.
Cornelia Jenner, secretary. They are all so newly alumna; that they
have a very vital interest in the active chapter. You, who walked beside me through the quiet hills, who shared
When we disbanded we found that another wand had been waved, my sun-flecked, sky-blue days, you are as dear to me as the roses are
rather strenuously waved, by the freshmen—and there were two long
tables laid for a banquet. We were all hungry and happy and tired; to summer, but—no dearer.
and ate and sang and talked for an hour or so, but were too much I had only an aesthetic desire for Completeness. Do you not
like a family to have speeches. understand? The wooded velvet of these hills seemed but the back-
ground for a pretty face. _ m ,„.m
After goodbyes to the alumna; we gathered in Irma's room, and
talked everything—socialism, home economics, the raising of children, 6 MURIEL FAIRBANKS, T, 1917.
fraternity policy, the meaning of life—just everything that could
occur to a "bunch" of girls. T H E HISTORY OF VANDERBILT
We hated to break up. I most of all. For it meant the end of Vanderbilt University owes its foundation to the munificence of
three very happy days that make one of the brightest spots in my Cornelius Vanderbilt, who made a donation on the twenty-seventh of
life and which showed me something so great and wonderful, and of March, 1873, of $500,000. Several other donations have come from
such high value that I cannot think of it except with a grateful the Vanderbilt family, beside gifts from Mr. Andrew Carnegie and
humility. I might have lived for years next door, might have passed patriotic citizens of Nashville, until today, while a comparatively
the house a dozen times a day, and i f I had been noticed at all it young university, Vanderbilt holds her own with any place of learn-
would have been in a vague way as a woman rather fattish, somewhat ing in the country. A great million dollar endowment campaign has
young, maternal looking—but of no special interest. But no! I just been successfully closed.
had been touched with magic. I was an Alpha O Sister. And those
blessed girls, ten years my junior, gave me a most wonderful, spon- There are several departments in the university—the College of
taneous, trustful love—not friendship nor toleration of my position— Arts and Science and the Schools of Engineering, Religion, Law,
Medicine, Pharmacy, and Dentistry. The scholarship standing is
but LOVE. very high, it is no small honor to receive a degree from any depart-
ment. I n 1901 Phi Beta Kappa voted a charter to Vanderbilt Uni-
In spite of my fierce democracy and socialistic impulses, I kneel versity.
at the shrine of the whole fraternity idea which makes possible the
giving of such a gift. Vanderbilt has two literary societies, a Student Council, Debating
Council, Y. M . C. A. and Y. W. C. A., Students' Association, and an
And Upsilon and Puget Sound Alumna;? Impulsive, enthusias- enthusiastic Alumni Association, good proof of the esteem former
tic, candid, vital as is every new chapter. God bless them! students have for their Alma Mater. There are eleven men's frater-
nities, beside numerous professional ones. The girls are represented
VIRGINIA ESTERLEY, by Kappa Alpha Theta, Delta Delta Delta, and Alpha Omicron Pi.
Western District Superintendent. The university is at present going through a crisis as are schools
and colleges everywhere, on account of the war. Men and women of
Vanderbilt have nobly responded to the call of their country, devoting
every afternoon to military drill and Red Cross work. Thousands
of her sons are already in service or in officers' training camps. The
Vanderbilt spirit still remains at home, however, and this spirit in-
sures for the university continual success. Whether it is in the class-
room or on the field of battle, Vanderbilt will not fail in her duty.
MARY D. HOUSTON, N O, '18.
