Wolf's Head (secret society) explained

Wolf's Head
Caption:Wolf's Head "New Hall" - architect Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue, designed circa 1924
Type:Secret society
local
Birthplace:Yale University
City:New Haven
State:Connecticut
Country:United States
Chapters:1
Scope:Local
Crest:File:Yale Wolf's Head Society facade.JPG
Affiliation:Independent
Emphasis:Seniors
Address:214 York Street

Wolf's Head Society is a senior secret society at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. The society is one of the reputed "Big Three" societies at Yale, along with Skull and Bones and Scroll and Key. Active undergraduate membership is elected annually with sixteen Yale University students, typically rising seniors. Honorary members are elected.

The current delegation spends its year together answerable to an alumni association.[1] [2] [3] Some past members have gained prominence in athletics, business, the fine and literary arts, higher education, journalism, and politics.

History

Fifteen rising seniors from the Yale Class of 1884, with help from members of the Yale Class of 1883 who were considered publicly possible taps for the older societies, abetted the creation of The Third Society. The society changed its name to Wolf's Head five years later.[4] [5] [6]

The effort was aided by more than 300 Yale College alumni[7] [8] and a few Yale Law School faculty, in part to counter the dominance of the Skull and Bones Society in undergraduate and university affairs.[6] [9]

The founding defeated the last attempt by the administration or the student body to abolish secret or senior societies at Yale.[10] The tradition continued of creating and sustaining a society if enough potential rising seniors thought they had been overlooked: Bones was established in 1832 after a dispute over selections for Phi Beta Kappa awards; Scroll and Key Society, the second society at Yale, was established in 1841 after a dispute over elections to Bones.

The Third Society's founding was motivated in part by sentiment among some young men that they deserved insider status. "[A] certain limited number were firmly convinced that there had been an appalling miscarriage of justice in their individual omission from the category of the elect," some founders agreed.[6] [11] [12]

Antecedents

Before the founding in 1780 at Yale of the Connecticut Alpha chapter of Phi Beta Kappa, the second chapter established after that society's founding in 1776 (which still practices a secret handshake among members),[13] Yale College students established and joined literary societies.[14] By the 1830s, the campus literary societies Linonia, Brothers in Unity, and Calliopean had lost stature. Calliopean folded in 1853, and the others shut down after the American Civil War.[15] Calliopean, Linonia, and Brothers in Unity existed respectively: 1819–1853, 1768–1878, and 1735–1868.[16]

From the mid-1840s until 1883, several societies were started, but each failed to sustain the interest of liberal arts students at Yale College, broadly known as the Academical Department.[17] Star and Dart, Sword and Crown, Tea-Kettle, Spade and Grave, and E.T.L. disbanded.[18]

Phi Beta Kappa was inactive at Yale from 1871 to 1884, coinciding in part with a national reorganization of the society.[19] In the 1820s, Anti-Masonic agitation sweeping across the United States prompted PBK to examine the role of secrecy in its proceedings. Associated with PBK's national reorganization in 1881, secrecy disappeared as a signature among all chapters, quelling rivalry with collegiate fraternities, clubs and societies.[20] Hence, secrecy was soon shelved at the Yale chapter.[21] PBK exists today, without any secrecy, as an academic honor society.

Beginning in the 1850s, the Yale undergraduate student body grew more diverse. The college was becoming an institution of national rather than regional importance. Students who hailed from environs beyond New England or who were not Congregationalist or Presbyterian entered the college in large numbers.[22]

The faculty and administration were dominated by alumni of Bones, numbering four out of five faculty members between 1865 and 1916. Bones alumni were university secretaries from 1869 to 1921. Bones alumni were university treasurers for forty-three of the forty-eight years between 1862 - 1910.[23] [24] Five of the first six Yale Corporation elected Alumni Fellows were members of Bones.[25]

Dissatisfaction grew: In 1873, The Iconoclast, a student paper published once,, advocated for the abolition of the society system. It opined: "Out of every class Skull and Bones takes its men...They have obtained control of Yale. Its business is performed by them. Money paid to the college must pass into their hands, and be subject to their will....It is Yale College against Skull and Bones!! We ask all men, as a question of right, which should be allowed to live?"[26] [27] The Yale Daily News first appeared on . A memoir of the first college daily's birth records its first year strategy to "rag" the societies.[28]

The Class of 1884 unanimously agreed to support a new revolt against the society system by issuing a vote of no confidence to coincide with their graduation. There was a widespread understanding that the existing society system was irredeemable and likely to be abolished.

A spirited defense of the society system appeared in the issue of The New Englander, written and published by members of Scroll and Key. Several periodicals reported regularly on the situation.[29]

Establishment

The initial delegation, including ten Class Day officers from the Class of 1884 and led by Edwin Albert Merritt, met in secret during their senior year with the aid of members of the Class of 1883 who were "eager to start a society provided the evil features of the old societies would be eliminated. [The graduating and rising seniors] were unanimous on this point." Included among the supporters from the Class of 1883 were members touted as sure selections to Bones or Keys by the publishers of the Horoscope, an undergraduate publication that provided feature material on the most likely taps. The pro-society seniors won the Class Day vote, 67 - 50.[30]

The new society was conceived on or about June 5, 1883. Among undergraduates the fledgling group was known as the "Fox and Grapes" for the Aesopian fable of jealousy.[31]

The two older societies suffered by comparison with Wolf's Head.[32] The New Haven Register reported in 1886: "Wolf's Head is not as far out of the world, in respect to its public doings, as are [Bones and Keys]. There is a sufficient veil of secrecy drawn around its mechanism, however, to class it with the secret societies, and this gives it a stability and respectability in Yale College circles that it might not have otherwise...."[33] The society was managed similarly to finals clubs associated with the Sheffield Scientific School; however, it soon took on almost all aspects of the older societies.[6]

Early stature

The Third Society sat at the apex of a social pyramid bricked by junior societies (sophomore societies were abolished in 1875, freshman societies in 1880),[34] campus organizations, athletic teams, clubs, and fraternities.[35] [36]

In 1888, the society changed its name to Wolf's Head Society, consonant with the approval among undergraduates of the society's pin, a stylized wolf's head on an inverted ankh, an Egyptian hieroglyphic known as the Egyptian Cross or "the key of life". The earliest undergraduate members allowed fellow schoolmates to handle the pin, a specific refutation of pin display by the older societies. Eternal life is symbolized rather than death or erudition. A Roman fasces had been considered as a design element for the pin.[6] [37]

Point of view

Many pioneering and subsequent members mocked as "poppycock" (from the Dutch for "soft excrement")[38] the seemingly Masonic-inspired rituals and atmosphere associated with Skull and Bones. The sentiment was widespread in the Yale community particularly among undergraduates. In their The Pirates of Penzance prank, Wolf's Head members persuaded the thespian pirate king to display the numbers 322 (part of the emblem of Skull and Bones) below a skull and crossbones at a local theatre.[39] In another example, Yale President A. Whitney Griswold's deprecated the rituals as "bonesy bullshit" and "Dink Stover crap" coloring undergraduate life.[40]

Wolf's Head did maintain many traditional practices, such as the Thursday and Sunday meetings, which were common among its peers. Paul Moore, Jr., long-time Senior Fellow and successor trustee (1964 - 1990) for the Yale Corporation and long-tenured bishop in the Episcopal Church (United States), recalled the night before he first encountered combat in World War II: "I spent the evening on board ship being quizzed by [a friend from Harvard] about what went on in Wolf's Head. He could not believe I would hold back such irrelevant secrets the night before I faced possible death."[41] [42]

Original Tomb

The original tomb, or hall, was erected within months of the founding. The older Academical Department societies met originally for decades in rented quarters near campus. Skull and Bones opened its tomb in 1856, more than two decades after its founding.[43] Scroll and Key did likewise; it opened its tomb in 1869 more than two decades after the society's founding.

A building with narrow windows, the domicile was noted as "the most modern and handsomest" of same purpose structures by The New York Times in 1903. The building was erected in 1884 soon after the founding members secured financing.[6]

Current Tomb

The building has stone wall and wrought iron fencing, and is central to the largest secret society compound on campus. The compound commands the most prominent location on campus beyond Harkness Tower, the very icon of Yale,[45] and the Memorial Quadrangle.

The domicile opened in the mid-1920s and sits fronted by York Street surrounded by the Yale Daily News Briton Hadden Memorial building, and the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University. The original School of Drama and theatre as well as the Briton Hadden Memorial Building, were gifts to Yale from Edward Harkness.[46] It is near the former homes of the Fence Club (or Psi Upsilon, 224 York Street), DKE (232 York Street) and Zeta Psi (212 York Street).

Membership

The society has been reputed to tap the gregarious "prep school type".[47] [48] Past members were associated intimately with the: coeducation of Yale College,[49] establishment of the Yale residential college system and the Harvard house system,[50] founding of the Elizabethan Club,[51] and founding of the Yale Political Union.[52]

This was Yale's last all-male society. Women have been tapped since the spring of 1992.[53]

Edward John Phelps, Envoy to the Court of St. James's, accepted the offer in 1885 to be namesake to the Wolf's Head alumni association.[6] The Phelps Association, as of January 2016, holds in trust nearly seven million dollars, second among Yale societies or clubs.[54]

Yale societies contrast sharply with Harvard finals clubs on membership criteria. Contributions to undergraduate life has been historically among the criteria for membership in Yale societies. Finals clubs overlook that quality among prospective members.[55] [56]

Notable members

References

Notes and References

  1. http://www.yaledailynews.com/blog/2013/05/02/dear-wolf's-head "Dear Wolf's Head"
  2. https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2017/10/05/new-book-ignites-society-debate/
  3. http://features.yaledailynews.com/blog/2017/02/24/the-choice-is-yours/ "The Choice is Yours"
  4. Web site: Timeline of Selected Events in the History of Yale University . Resources on Yale History. Yale University Library. March 19, 2010. 2011-08-01.
  5. Web site: Yale Alumni Publications, Inc.. March 2001 Tercentennial Edition - An Irrepressible Urge to Join . Yale Alumni Magazine. 2011-08-01.
  6. Andrews, John. History of the Founding of Wolf's Head, Lancaster Press, 1934. Phelps Trust Association archives, Sterling Memorial Library, Yale University.
  7. Bulletin of Yale University, New Haven, 15 October 1932, Obituary Record of Graduates of Yale University Deceased during the Year 1931 - 1932, pg. 32, Henry Blodget, B.A. 1875, and pg. 44, John Proctor Clarke, B.A. 1878
  8. Obituary Record of Yale University 1924 - 1925, Bulletin of Yale University, New Haven, Twenty-First Series, August 1, 1925, Number Twenty - Two, Abram Heaton Robertson, B.A. 1872, pg. 1316, Gardner Green, B.A. 1873, pg. 1319
  9. Web site: John Williams Andrews . History of the founding of Wolf's Head. Open Library. 2008-04-01. 6318007M . 2011-08-01.
  10. Richards, David Alan. Skulls and Keys, Pegasus Books, Ltd. NY, NY, 2017, pp. 284 - 327, "The Solution of Wolf's Head (1883 - 1888)" pp. 284 - 327.
  11. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1903/09/13/102434474.pdf "Changes in Skull and Bones, Famous Yale Society Doubles Size of its House - Addition a Duplicate of Old Building"
  12. Oren, Dan. Joining the Club: A History of Jews and Yale, Second Edition. Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 2000. pp. 332-333. .
  13. Nadrina Ebrahimi, Yale Daily News, "Phi Beta Kappa to induct 25 students", 7 December 2016,
  14. Web site: Welcome | Yale Phi Beta Kappa . Yale.edu . 2016-09-04.
  15. Secrets of the Tomb, pp. 36, 38.
  16. Web site: Yale's Extracurricular & Social Organizations, 1780 - 1960. Loomis. Havemeyer. 5, 8. Yale Library. Loomis Havemeyer.
  17. [Alexandra Robbins|Robbins, Alexandra]
  18. Andrews, p. 75.
  19. Joining the Club. p. 22.
  20. Web site: Phi Beta Kappa - History. Clubs.psu.edu. 2016-09-04.
  21. Web site: Tombs and Taps, An inside look at Yale's Fraternities, Sororities and Societies . Conspiracyarchive.com. 2011-08-01.
  22. Stephenson, Louise L. Scholarly Means to Evangelical Ends: The New Haven Scholars and the Transformation of Higher Learning in America.The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986, p. 64; .
  23. Secrets of the Tomb. pp. 48, 50, 127.
  24. Joining the Club. p. 26.
  25. Skulls and Keys, p. xix
  26. Andrews, p. 39.
  27. Karabel, Jerome. The Chosen: The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston and New York, 2005. p. 56. .
  28. Skulls and Keys, p. 259
  29. Andrews, pp. 58-61.
  30. Andrews, p. 70.
  31. Skulls and Keys, p.293 and p.292
  32. Skulls and Keys, p. 320
  33. Secrets of the Tomb, p. 63.
  34. Andrews, p. 46.
  35. 38.
  36. Kabaservice, Geoffrey. The Guardians: Kingman Brewster, His Circle, and the Rise of the Liberal Establishment. Henry Holt and Company, New York, 2004. p. 45. .
  37. Secrets of the Tomb. p. 68.
  38. Web site: Poppycock | Definition of Poppycock by Merriam-Webster . Merriam-webster.com . 2016-09-04.
  39. Secrets of the Tomb, pp. 3-4, 67, 84-85.
  40. The Guardians. p. 155.
  41. Yale officers: Founding Trustees and their successors,[www.guides.library.yale.edu]
  42. Moore, Paul. Presences: A Bishop's Life in the City. Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, New York, 1997. pp. 55-56; .
  43. Yale Alumni Magazine, May/Jun 2015, "The Origins of the tomb: How Skull and Bones found a home", by David Richards
  44. Web site: Institution for Social and Policy Studies. Yale.edu. 2016-09-04.
  45. Web site: Yale University Guild of Carillonneurs - Harkness Carillon and Guild Information. Yale.edu. 2016-09-04. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20001109052100/http://www.yale.edu/carillon/yamasaki.htm. 2000-11-09.
  46. Kelley, Brooks Mather.Yale: A History, Yale University Press, New Haven and London. p. 374. .
  47. Web site: Inside Eli, or How to Get On at Yale. Yale56.org. 1955–56. 2011-08-01.
  48. Secrets of the Tomb. p. 69.
  49. "The Guardians". p. 64
  50. Yale Alumni Publications, Inc.. How the Colleges Were Born . May–June 2008 . Judith Ann Schiff. Yale Alumni Magazine: Old Yale . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20080522125640/http://www.yalealumnimagazine.com/issues/2008_05/old_yale.html . 2008-05-22 . 2013-10-09.
  51. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1911/11/20/104843291.pdf "Real Shakespeare Treasures For Yale"
  52. The Guardians. p. 51.
  53. http://www.deseretnews.com/article/199795/YALE-WOLFS-HEAD-ADMITS-WOMEN.html "Yale Wolf's Head Admits Women"
  54. Business Insider, Jan. 5, 2016, 5:01 ET, by line Abby Jackson
  55. Web site: Eleven Final Clubs: From Pig to Bat | News | the Harvard Crimson.
  56. Web site: YALE's FINEST HOURS | News | the Harvard Crimson.
  57. Web site: The Skulls and Bones Exposed. Scribd.com. 2009-02-18. 2011-08-01.
  58. News: Leigh Bardugo On 'Ninth House'. NPR.org. en. 2019-12-04.
  59. Yale Banner and Pot Pourri Yearbook, New Haven, CT, Class of 1957, pg. 47
  60. Memorabilia Yalensis. The Yale Literary Magazine. 84. 6. 269. June 1919. 2011-08-01.
  61. Skulls and Keys, p. 302
  62. Skull and Keys, pg. 319
  63. Yale University Banner and Pot Pourri yearbook, New Haven, CT - Class of 1929, pg.109
  64. Yale Pot Pourri and Banner yearbook, Class of 1956, pg. 43
  65. The Chosen, p. 653.
  66. Bulletin of Yale University, New Haven 15 October 1932, Obituary Record of Graduates of Yale University Deceased during the Year 1931 - 1932
  67. Harvard Crimson, "Yale Society Elections", published May 24, 1895.
  68. Web site: Mayor Erastus Corning: Albany Icon. Webhome.idirect.com. April 21, 1954. 2011-08-01.
  69. Yale University Banner and Pot Pourri Yearbook, New Haven, CT - Class of 1895, pg. 183
  70. Yale Banner and Pot Pourri Yearbook, New Haven, CT - Yale Class of 1952, pg. 39
  71. Yale Banner and Pot Pourri Yearbook, New Haven, CT - Yale Class of 1949
  72. Yale Banner and Pot Pourri Yearbook, New Haven, CT - Class of 1954, pg. 35
  73. http://www.blogs.law.harvard.edu/lydon"Dem Bones, Dem Bones...and the Magic of Yale"
  74. Box/folder number, Mss. A. Conger Goodyear Papers, 1683 - 1964 (bulk 1885 - 1964), Research Library, Buffalo History Museum,
  75. Joining the Club, p. 182.
  76. Skull and Keys, pg. 484
  77. Memorabilia Yalensis. The Yale Literary Magazine. 61. 9. 409. June 1896. 2011-08-01.
  78. The Five Roles of Robert Maynard Hutchins, DePaul University Libraries, Volume 42 Issue 2, Winter 1992, DePaul Law Review, Article 9, Jeffrey O'Connell, Thomas E. O'Connell, footnote 62
  79. Henderson, Clayton W. The Charles Ives Tunebook - Second Edition, Indiana University Press, Bloomington and Indianapolis, 2008. p. 367; .
  80. Web site: Jay. Fire Dick Jauron!: The Continuing Story of Buffalo Dick. Firedickjauron.blogspot.com. October 10, 2007. 2011-08-01.
  81. Skull and Keys, p. 319
  82. Joining the Club, pp. 175, 409.
  83. Web site: Google. 2016-09-04.
  84. Skulls and Keys, p. 319
  85. Andrews, John, The Founding of Wolf's Head Society, Lancaster Press, pg. 70
  86. http://calteches.library.caltech.edu/253/01/clark.pdf "Caltech obituary - Clark"
  87. Yale University Banner and Pou Pourri Yearbook, New Haven, CT, Class of 1924, pg. 89
  88. Six Yale Societies Elect 90 Members, New York Times, May 8, 1936
  89. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1915/05/21/100153969.pdf "Yale's Great Oak Sees 'Tap Day' Again"
  90. [Honor Moore|Moore, Honor]
  91. My Harvard, My Yale, editor, Diana DuBois, chapter "A Touch of Laughter", author, Rt. Rev. Paul Moore, Random House, New York, 1982,
  92. Yale University Banner and Pot Pourri Yearbook, New Haven, CT - Class of 1937, pg. 67
  93. Yale University Banner and Pot Pourri Yearbook, New Haven, CT - Class of 1929, pg. 109
  94. News: Funeral of E.J. Phelps - Ex-President Dwight of Yale Pays a Feeling Tribute to the Dead - Interment in Vermont. New York Times. March 11, 1900. 2011-08-01.
  95. Yale University Banner and Pot Pourri Yearbook, New Haven, CT, Class of 1924, pg. 89
  96. The Bridgeport Telegraph, Friday, May 16, 1924, pg. 28 and Saturday, May 17, 1924, pg. 16
  97. News: Rattling Those Dry Bones. Cedotal. Andrew. April 18, 2006. Yale Daily News. https://web.archive.org/web/20110801000000/http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/2006/apr/18/rattling-those-dry-bones. 2011-08-01.
  98. Skulls and Keys, p. 657
  99. http://yaleherald.com/bulldog/secret-society-2013-who-they-are-and-how-they-got-in "Secret Society 2013: Who they are, and how they got in!"
  100. Skulls and Keys, p. 303
  101. Morrisroe, Patricia. Mapplethorpe: A Biography, Random House, New York, 1995. p. 115; .
  102. Yale University Banner and Pot Pourri Yearbook, Class of 1958, New Haven, CT, pg. 61
  103. http://www.houstonclassmates.com > FamousAlumni.asp

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Wolf's Head (secret society)".

Except where otherwise indicated, Everything.Explained.Today is © Copyright 2009-2024, A B Cryer, All Rights Reserved. Cookie policy.