Famous Phi Psi’s |
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In addition to the accomplishments of New Jersey Epsilons’, the
fraternity as a whole has a phenomenal record of alumni accomplishment
in all fields of endeavor. Although this
has been true throughout her 150-year history, note below how Phi Psi had a
special preponderance of influential men during World War I, including the
fraternity’s most famous and historically significant alumnus, President
Woodrow Wilson. Four of these alumni listed below were initiated
as honorary members well into their careers, a common practice of
fraternities, which was discontinued by Phi Kappa Psi in 1885. The majority of the following brothers remained
actively involved with the fraternity throughout their lives, including the
honorary members. Most of them are
mentioned in the National FKY Manual, but their achievements are worth a more
detailed look. In celebrating Phi Kappa
Psi’s sesquicentennial in 2002, the fraternity can take great pride in the
remarkable achievements of its members. |
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Business
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Government
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The fraternity has produced many more leaders in various fields. In government, there have been approximately 110 Phi Psi’s in Congress, including 17 senators. Ohio Senator Joseph Foraker, NY A (Cornell), OH A (Ohio Wesleyan) 1866, the fraternity’s first national president, was a strong contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 1908. He was also the Governor of Ohio and president of Cornell University. Five senators served during World War I, including the chairmen of the powerful Military Affairs (now the Armed Services) Committee, George Chamberlain of Oregon, VA B (Washington and Lee) 1872, and the Finance Committee, Ellison Smith of South Carolina, SC A (South Carolina) 1885. Considering that these five brothers represented over 5% of the then 96-member Senate, as well as the other Phi Psi World War I leaders (president, congressional leaders, ambassador to Britain and future Democratic presidential nominee, Alien Property Custodian and future Attorney General, Army chief of staff, commander of Army aviation and future “Father of the Air Force,” most highly decorated Army officer and future founder of the OSS, 1st Infantry Division commander), the fraternity’s leadership during this period was truly remarkable. It is doubtful that any other college organization can claim such a record The federal executive branch,
including those listed above, has included two Attorneys-General, a Treasury
Secretary, a Commerce Secretary, an Interior Secretary, two Army Secretaries,
a Postmaster General, two Directors of the Peace Corps, a State Department
Chief of Protocol (Lloyd Hand, TX A [Texas] ‘48), an F.D.I.C.
Chairman, and seven ambassadors.
The judicial branch has included many federal judges, including
one on the Supreme Court and a few on some of the Circuit Courts of Appeal. There have been legions of Phi Psi alumni holding office at the state
level, including many state legislators and ten governors. Among this number was William Sproul,
PA K (Swarthmore) 1889, a pledge brother of A. Mitchell Palmer (see list
above) and Pennsylvania’s World War I chief executive, who turned down the
Republican presidential nomination in 1920 when it was offered to him by his
friend — the man who went on to claim it and win the election — Warren G.
Harding. The recent governor of
Indiana is Evan Bayh, IN B (Indiana) ‘75 (currently a U.S. senator from
Indiana), who as the nation’s youngest chief executive was listed in Time
magazine in 1994 as one of the country’s most promising young leaders, and
possibly a future candidate for the presidency. He was on the short list for the 2000 Democratic vice
presidential nomination, and was recently featured on televised news-talk
shows discussing America’s role in the War on Terrorism following the
terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Among many state supreme court justices are numbered a few
chief justices, including none other than the late 19th century
chief justice of West Virginia, Charles P. T. Moore, PA A (Jefferson) 1852, VA A (Virginia) 1853,
one of the fraternity’s two founders.
John W. Davis, VA B
(Washington and Lee) 1889 – Democratic nominee for President of the
United States in 1924 (Calvin Coolidge won the general election), generally
considered to be the last conservative nominated by the Democratic Party;
Ambassador to Britain during World War I (where he was referred to as “the
most perfect gentleman I have ever met” by King George V); U.S. Solicitor
General; congressman from West Virginia; president of the American Bar
Association; a founder of the Council of Foreign Relations; America’s most
prominent appellate attorney of his generation – arguing more cases before
the U.S. Supreme Court than anyone else in the 20th century (only two,
including Daniel Webster, exceeded him in the 19th century) including the
monumental Brown v. Board of Education and Steel Seizure cases; declined
nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court; practiced law after college in West
Virginia and after World War I as a partner in a New York firm, biography – Lawyer’s
Lawyer, the Life of John W. Davis James
Watson, IN A (DePauw) 1881 – U.S. Senate Majority Leader from 1929-1933;
Governor of Indiana; U.S. Congressman from Indiana and Republican Party Whip J. Warren
Keifer, OH B (Wittenberg) 1868 (honorary member) – Speaker of the U.S.
House of Representatives from 1881-1885; Federal major general wounded in the
Virginia theater of the Civil War, and major general of volunteers in the
Spanish-American War over 33 years later; reelected to Congress in 1904 after
many years of retirement; attorney Charles
Sumner, IN A (DePauw) 1867 (honorary member) – Republican senator from
Massachusetts 1850-1874 (succeeded to Daniel Webster’s seat) and one of the
best known statesmen of the Civil War era, one of the primary “Radical
Republicans” who built the Republican Party and advocated abolition, support
of Abraham Lincoln, vigorous prosecution of the Civil War, and punitive
Reconstruction; his near-fatal caning at his desk on the floor of the Senate
chamber at the hands of an enraged South Carolina senator in 1855 provoked
outrage throughout the North and delight throughout the South, and among its
repercussions was the “Bleeding Sumner” GOP rallying cry (complimenting the
well known phrase “Bleeding Kansas”) and sparking John Brown to carry out the
Pottawatomie Creek Massacre in Kansas before he attacked Harper’s Ferry,
Virginia and was subsequently executed and martyred Carl Schurz, NY A (Cornell) 1870 (honorary member) – Well known 19th Century renaissance man – statesman, soldier, author, and thinker; revolutionist in his native Prussia; U.S. Minister to Spain; Federal major general and XI Corps commander in the Army of the Potomac during the Civil War; first German-born U.S. senator (Republican, Missouri); U.S. Secretary of the Interior; zealous reformer in both the Civil Service and the Indian Bureau; one historian wrote, “During the last twenty years of his life Schurz was perhaps the most prominent Independent in American politics, and even more notable than his great abilities was his devotion to high principles.” A.
Mitchell Palmer, PA K (Swarthmore) 1889 – U.S. Attorney General after
World War I who later gained historical notoriety due to his primary
responsibility for the post-war “Red Scare,” which has been generally viewed
as an excessively hysterical and violent national response to the threat of
international Communism; Alien Property Custodian during World War I; U.S.
congressman from Pennsylvania; two-time Democratic presidential candidate
during the 1920s Pierce
Butler, MN A (Carleton) 1885 – Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme
Court from 1922-1939; one of the court’s conservative “Four Horsemen” who
stringently resisted New Deal reforms and which resulted in President
Franklin Roosevelt’s controversial “court packing plan” – an attempt to
circumvent the “nine old men” of the court, including Butler; appointed
through the efforts of his friend Chief Justice (and former U.S. president)
William Howard Taft; earlier known as one of the country’s foremost railroad
lawyers and “the most ruthless cross examiner practicing in the courts of
that day;” county attorney and president of the Minnesota Bar Association Michael Bloomberg, MD A (Johns Hopkins) ‘61 – Mayor of New York City at this writing, elected following the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001; internationally prominent stock trader and billionaire who founded Bloomberg L.P., which developed Bloomberg financial data terminals used world-wide, and founded Bloomberg News, a financial cable news service on multiple media vehicles; Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Johns Hopkins University
Paul Coverdell, Senator from Georgia, MO A (Missouri) ‘59,
died in 2001. Coverdell was a congressional leader and
the point man in the Senate for the 2000 campaign of President George W.
Bush. Upon Bro. Coverdell’s death,
former President George H. W. Bush said, “Paul Coverdell was one of the
kindest and most decent men I met in my entire life. We shall miss him as we would miss our own
son.” Bro. Coverdell had also served as
minority leader in the Georgia state senate and Director of the United States
Peace Corps under President George H. W. Bush. As a loyal Phi Psi, he also delivered the keynote address to
the Woodrow Wilson Leadership School in Atlanta in 1999 Currently, the Senate includes Evan Bayh of Indiana, IN B (Indiana)
‘75 |
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Military |
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Phi Psi has a long and
distinguished record of military service, including approximately 60
general officers in the Army (including three Texas Alphans), Air
Force, and Marines and 20 flag officers in the Navy (including three more
Texas Alphans). Claiming as members
of the fraternity the “Father of the Air Force,” America’s most highly
decorated officer of World War I, and an Army Chief of Staff (see the list
above for these bios), among many other notable leaders, Phi Kappa Psi
proudly continues today to claim high-ranking commanders in all military
branches that prepare for the conflicts of the 21st century. Although the fraternity was only nine years old at the outbreak of the
Civil War, ten alumni became general officers including the
Quartermaster-General of the Confederacy, Charles Ballou, VA B (Washington
and Lee) 1855. Seventy percent of
Phi Psis (552 known members) fought on one side or the other, with a slightly
larger amount for the South. Over 100
were killed in action or died of wounds.
Ironically the two founders of Phi Kappa Psi chose opposite sides in
the war. Bro. Letterman, the
Pennsylvanian, was a civilian contract surgeon for the Army in Baltimore who,
it is believed, sympathized with the South, while Bro. Moore, the patrician
Virginian (from what later became West Virginia), chose to side with the
North. Of course, this did nothing to
dispel their fraternal feeling for each other and all Phi Psis across the
fractured nation. Although the war
split many chapters whose members fought for both sides, Phi Psis
purposefully avoided political conflict in both formal meetings and informal
gatherings, and treated members from different areas of the country with
brotherhood. The last minutes of
Virginia Alpha at the University of Virginia before the chapter broke up for
the war recorded the following: The question arose
whether, if we should meet a Phi Psi in an opposing army, we should raise our
hand against him. It was decided that
we should not, but if he were captured, to take the best care of him. The Centennial History of
the Phi Kappa Psi Fraternity, Volume I, page 90. Accounts of brothers from various
chapters indicate that this spirit was observed throughout the conflict
William “Wild Bill” Donovan, NY G (Columbia) ‘03 – Founder and chief
of the OSS during World War II, which was the Office of Strategic Services –
the precursor of the CIA; Major General, U.S. Army; as a colonel during World
War I commanded the “Fighting 69th” Infantry Regiment, and was the American
Expeditionary Force’s (the U.S. Army in Europe) most highly decorated officer
– including America’s highest decoration for valor – the Medal of Honor;
later was special ambassador for presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Harry S.
Truman; attorney; New York gubernatorial candidate; subject of biographies Tasker Bliss, PA G (Bucknell) 1870 – General, U.S.
Army; one of the officers holding the position of Army Chief of Staff during
World War I (the Army’s highest ranking officer); only America’s fifth full
general (four stars); U.S. military representative to the Versailles Peace
Conference of 1919; instrumental in development of the modern U.S. General
Staff at the turn of the 20th century, which is used by the
American military to this day Frank Parker, SC A (South Carolina) 1888
– Major General, U.S. Army; commander of the famed 1st Infantry Division (the
“Big Red One”) in France during World War I, where he earned the nickname
“Machine Gun Parker” Daniel Van Voorhis, OH A (Ohio Wesleyan),
PA A (Washington and Jefferson) 1897 – Lieutenant General, U.S.
Army; one of the primary founders and developers of the Army’s armor force
(tanks) after World War I, including armored warfare doctrine; featured in
the U.S. Army’s Armor Museum in Fort Knox, Kentucky; high ranking officer of
World War II |
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Education |
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In the field of education, the
fraternity has produced a large number of college presidents, recently
including MIT, West Virginia, Cincinnati, San Francisco, and – well known to
older Texas Phi Psi’s listening to announcer Wally Prior at UT football games
at Memorial Stadium – Slippery Rock University. Among many others, Phi Psi’s have served as past presidents at
schools including Pennsylvania, Johns Hopkins, Penn State, Illinois,
Kentucky, Case Western Reserve, Montana (George Simmons, TX A [Texas] ‘19),
Washington & Jefferson (home of the fraternity’s first chapter), Cornell,
and of course, Princeton (Woodrow Wilson, VA A [Virginia] 1879). Phi Psi educators have played a prominent
role in America’s intellectual development.
Their presence on the nation’s campuses also helps the fraternity and
benefits the overall system. Many
other Phi Psi’s have also made their mark in scholarship in various ways
through the years. |
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Arts |
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James Thurber, OH D (Ohio State) ‘18 – Pulitzer
Prize-winning author and one of America’s greatest humorists of the 20th
century; his works are known for their vivid imagination such as The
Secret Life of Walter Mitty; his first book, Is Sex Necessary?,
was published in 1929; very well known for his famous cartoons that started
to appear in The New Yorker magazine in 1931, later became
editor of The New Yorker; considered to be a major figure of the
country’s cosmopolitan circles of the pre-war years and mid-century; subject
of many biographies and documentaries; as an example of his wit, he once
observed, “One martini is just right, two is too many, and three is not
enough” Frederick Jackson Turner, WI A (Wisconsin) 1878 – One of
the most influential American historians of all time, whose seminal 1893
essay The Significance of the Frontier in American History, the
central features of which are commonly taught in colleges and high schools,
did more to usher in modern historiography and has done more to reshape the
writing of American history than perhaps any other work; Turner’s
thought-provoking essays posited the end of the American frontier and its
effects, and have been studied ever since to gain insight into the popularly
held image of the American past and American characteristics; his views
continue to shape the controversial field of Western American history, whose
scholars often think of themselves as “Turnerian,” “anti-Turnerian,” or even
“neo-Turnerian” and “post-Turnerian.” James Whitcomb Riley, IN A (Depauw) 1883
(honorary member) – The “Hoosier Poet” of Indiana, and nationally known man
of letters; his best-selling verses had a rural, Norman Rockwell-type
quality; lived on Lockerbie Square in Indianapolis next to the present-day
Phi Kappa Psi national headquarters |
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Entertainment |
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Charles “Buddy” Rogers, KS A (Kansas) ‘23
– Early Hollywood screen actor, and later a big band leader; co-star of history’s
first Academy Award-winner for Best Picture, in 1927 — the silent movie Wings;
second husband of “America’s Sweetheart” of the silent era — Mary Pickford;
along with his wife and others was one of the founders of United Artists
Studios Edward Everett Horton, NY Z (Brooklyn
Polytechnic) ‘07, NY G (Columbia) ‘08 – Comic actor of stage and screen; starred in
many Broadway productions and had large roles in some of the famous Fred
Astaire – Ginger Rogers musicals of the 1930s such as Top Hat and The
Gay Divorcee Frank Wuppermann, NY A (Cornell) ‘08 – Venerable character actor during the early decades of motion picture history with the stage name “Frank Morgan;” probably his best-known role was none other than “The Wizard of Oz” in the classic, golden-age 1939 movie of the same name
Biography
John Astin, PA A (Washington and
Jefferson), MD A (Johns Hopkins) ‘49 – Television and screen
actor; star of the classic 1960s TV series The Addams Family; formerly
married to actress Patty Duke, their son is actor Sean Astin (The Lord of
the Rings)
Edward Hermann, IL A (Northwestern) ‘72
– Screen and television actor; star of the acclaimed TV mini-series Eleanor
and Franklin in the 1970s and many other movies; host of the History
Channel’s Our Century, many other documentaries, and pitchman for
Dodge commercials Sylvester “Pat” Weaver, NH A (Dartmouth)
‘27 – Pioneering television executive; president of NBC during the
1950s and creator of the “Today Show,” “Tonight Show,” and many others; he
strongly believed in the democratizing influence of television; a Phi Beta
Kappa scholar in college at Dartmouth; during World War II helped with the
broadcasting of anti-fascist radio to South America for the Office of the
Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs under Nelson Rockefeller; member of the
Television Academy’s Hall of Fame; father of well known actress Sigourney
Weaver Steve Tesich, IN B (Indiana) ‘62
– Academy Award-winning screenwriter, playwright, and novelist; won an Oscar
for writing the screenplay to Breaking Away in 1979, which was based
on the “Little 500” bike race at IU that was originally started by the Phi
Psis of Indiana Beta Roy Crane, TX A (Texas) ’22 –
Creator of the nationally syndicated comic strips “Buzz Sawyer” and “Wash
Tubbs,” which were popular across the country from the 1930s through 1960s;
periodically featured the University of Texas and the old UT Phi Psi House
(with the FKY
letters prominently displayed) in his comic strips when Buzz Sawyer would
revisit his old college haunts; for more details see the appendix entitled
“Prominent Alumni of Texas Alpha” |
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Sports |
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In athletics, there have been many Olympic medallists in various
sports, including Perry O’Brien, CA D (Southern California) ‘50, who
created the modern spin-method of shot putting. Many other alumni have starred in professional sports. The fraternity also claims many
administrators such as professional league presidents, college athletic
directors, and professional team owners and presidents, including William
R. Putnam, TX A (Texas) ‘49, president of the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks, and Jerry
Colangelo, IL D (Illinois)
’59, managing general partner of the 2001 World Series champion Arizona
Diamondbacks and former general manger of the NBA’s Phoenix Suns. Mark Spitz, IN B (Indiana) ‘69 – American Olympic icon as
the record setting seven-time gold medallist (also setting a world record in each
of the seven events) as an Olympic swimmer at the 1972 games in Munich —
simply one of the most dominating performances in Olympic history; won two
other gold medals in the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City; his quest for seven
gold medals was a recent subject of the show “This Week in History” on the
History Channel; Spitz is one of the best known international athletes of
modern times Nile Kinnick, IA A (Iowa) ‘38 –
College football’s Heisman Trophy winner in 1939 from the University of Iowa,
as well as the Maxwell Trophy winner and a Phi Beta Kappa scholar; tragically
killed shortly thereafter in World War II as a Naval officer; namesake of the
home of Iowa Hawkeyes’ football – Kinnick Stadium; he made a big impact while
giving one of the most memorable acceptance speeches in Heisman history, when,
shortly after the outbreak of World War II but two years before America’s
entry, he said, “I thank God I was born to the gridirons of the Midwest and
not to the battlefields of Europe” – it was a tremendous irony that this man
who had so much overall promise that people had predicted he would become
President of the United States would himself die in this war before his prime Ron Yary, CA D (Southern California) ‘66 – recent
member of the Professional Football Hall of Fame (inducted 2001) as a lineman
and leader with the Minnesota Vikings during their powerful years of the
1960s and 1970s when they made four Super Bowl appearances; multi-year Pro
Bowler, was a two-time All-American at USC and won the 1967 Outland Trophy
recognizing college football’s top lineman; number one NFL draft pick in 1968 George Yardley, CA B (Stanford) ‘47
– Six-time NBA All-Star corner man with the Detroit Pistons known as “The
Bird;” member of the National Basketball Hall of Fame; first player to score
2,000 points in a season (1957-58); one historian listed him as one of the
game’s all-time greats Texas “Tex” Schramm, TX A (Texas) ’40
– Long-time president, general manager, public face and creative genius of
the Dallas Cowboys – building the country’s most popular sports franchise
commonly known as “America’s Team;” hired Hall of Fame coaching legend Tom
Landry and developed NFL standards regarding computerized scouting,
marketing, and entertainment such as the ground-breaking Dallas Cowboys
Cheerleaders; he is the only team executive to be inducted into the
Professional Football Hall of Fame, due to his tremendous impact in building
the Cowboys and on the development of the NFL as a whole in such areas as the
NFL-AFL merger, strike resolution, rules-making, instant replay, and race
relations; as a television executive with CBS was instrumental to the
development of sports television, including producing the first televised
Winter Olympic games; for more details of his many accomplishments see the
appendix entitled “Prominent Alumni of Texas Alpha”and the body of this book Forrest “Phog” Allen, KS A (Kansas) ‘05
– Considered the “Dean of American Basketball,” one of the game’s primary
developers, and the first nationally recognized coach; long-time coach and
athletic director of the University of Kansas (39 years) where he built the
Jayhawks’ winning tradition, won national championships, and is the namesake
of KU’s home court – Allen Fieldhouse; founded the NCAA playoff tournament in
1939; first president of the National Association of Basketball Coaches;
established the first U.S. Olympic basketball team Ford Frick, IN A (Depauw) ‘13 –
Major League Baseball Commissioner elected in 1951; had been president of the
National League since 1934; formerly a well known New York sportswriter and
reputed ghost writer for Babe Ruth Ralph Miller, KS A (Kansas) ‘38
– Long-time legendary basketball coach of the Oregon State University
Beavers; member of the National Basketball Hall of Fame; was the
sixth-winningest coach in NCAA history with 674 victories in 38 years of
coaching when he retired in 1989; twice named Pac-10 Coach of the Year and
won four Pac-10 titles, taking Oregon State to five top 10 finishes; also won
two Big 10 titles as head coach at Iowa; in college at Kansas played for
legendary coach Phog Allen, KS A ’05, (above) Terry Bowden, WV A (West Virginia) ‘75
– Coach of the Auburn University football team, going undefeated his first
year with the War Eagles; college football analyst and commentator for the
ABC television network; son of legendary Florida State football coach Bobby
Bowden Dick Tomey, IN A (Depauw) ‘57 –
Coach of the University of Arizona football team; brought an average Wildcats
team to consistent national rankings in the 1990s |
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Business |
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Clarence Coleman, KS A (Kansas) ‘29
– President of Coleman Camping Equipment, the quintessential supplier of
American camping gear that was founded by his father Jerry Yang, CA B (Stanford) ‘87
– Co-founder and current owner of the highly successful and predominate
internet search engine “Yahoo!” Many chairmen, presidents and CEOs through the
years of a huge number of prominent American business corporations that are
simply too long to list. |
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Miscellaneous |
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John F. Kennedy, Jr., RI A (inactivated
chapter at Brown) ’79 – Son of President John F. Kennedy and
Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, and internationally known playboy and publisher
of the political magazine George; JFK, Jr. is not an initiated Phi Psi
because the chapter he joined at Brown University in 1979, Rhode Island
Alpha, had withdrawn its Phi Kappa Psi charter during the late ‘70s before he
joined, but the members called themselves “Phi Psis” and the chapter was
later reactivated in 1984, so it may be accurate to consider him a prominent
man connected with the fraternity’s history as a “pseudo-alumnus;” JFK Jr.
was commonly seen as the idolized heir to the “Camelot” tradition of the
Kennedy family’s political prominence before his premature death while
piloting an airplane in 1999 with his fiancée; while known across the country
as “John-John,” his poignant three-year old salute to his father’s passing
casket in 1963 was one of the most indelible images in American history |
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