Delta Psi (University of Vermont)
| Delta Psi | |
|---|---|
| ΔΨ | |
 |
|
| Founded | 1850 University of Vermont |
| Type | Social |
| Scope | Local |
| Colors |
Old gold Dregs of wine |
| Chapters | 1 (defunct) |
Delta Psi (ΔΨ) is a fraternity formerly active at the University of Vermont that was associated with the early history of Delta Upsilon.
Delta Psi was founded at the University of Vermont in 1850 by John Ellsworth Goodrich and eight other freshmen classics students. It was the third fraternity organized at Vermont, after Lambda Iota and Sigma Phi. The following year, in 1851, Delta Psi joined the Anti-Secret Confederation (A.S.C.) that had been convened by several independent northeastern fraternities. (The confederation later changed its name to Delta Upsilon.)
The establishment of Delta Psi at Vermont was met with disdain by student newspaper The College Maul, which opined:
Subsequent issues of the paper included similar denouncements. Nonetheless, Delta Psi's policy of pledging freshmen helped quickly grow the chapter and pressured Lambda Iota and Sigma Phi into opening themselves to underclass students.
Delta Psi severed its connections with the A.S.C. in 1854, three years after it joined. The cause of separation is lost to history with Delta Upsilon's own records recording that the exit of Delta Psi is "from causes unknown to us." A Delta Psi historian later claimed the withdrawal was due to the expenses the fraternity was incurring sending delegates to the meetings of the Anti-Secret Confederation. It's also bmeen speculated that Delta Psi felt local pressure in maintaining the A.S.C.'s militant stance against secret ritual; after separating from the A.S.C. it undertook secret work. Delta Upsilon has maintained that it does not consider members of Delta Psi during the period it was affiliated with the A.S.C. to also be members of Delta Upsilon, the separation being so total that the "action removed all its members from membership in the Delta Upsilon fraternity."
As a local fraternity, Delta Psi experienced substantial growth under the leadership of then student Charles H. Heath, becoming the largest fraternity on campus by the middle 1800s.
Delta Psi did not become a residential fraternity until 1903 when it acquired its first house with the assistance of its aging founding father, Goodrich, by then a professor of Latin at the university. (Vermont was a non-residential campus until 1895 when the first dormitory opened.) Later, in 1924, Delta Psi purchased and moved into a new home, continuing to use it until the fraternity's undergraduate organization was shut-down.
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