About Delta Upsilon
History
The Original Chapter
For one year after the founding of the University of Rochester, student activity was limited to membership in one of two true literary societies. These literary societies met in rooms belonging to the college and as promoters of the intellectual improvement of their members, threw their doors open to any men who wished membership. However, with 1851, secret societies had found their place at Rochester and greatly hampered the livelihood of the literary groups. At first, the secret societies were able to control the appointment of officers and exclude neutrals from literary work.
In response to the "evils of secrecy", a number of individuals from the literary societies formed an anti-secret organization. However, the existence of this organization was quickly terminated by the secret fraternities. Some of those anti-secret men, however, were able to form a new literary club as a means of keeping their ideals alive.
Word of the goings-on at Rochester reached the Hamilton Chapter of the Fraternity, which became very excited at the prospect of forming a new chapter. Immediately, a Hamilton alumnus Milton T. Hills, was contacted at his home in Mt. Morris, New York, and was given the duty of forming an anti-secret organization, and hopefully a branch of the Confederation, at Rochester. Hills himself first contacted Fordyce Williams, who was a member of the former short-lived anti-secret organization at Rochester (and who later earned the title "founder of the Rochester Chapter") and the two found six other men to support their cause. These men, part of the fate of the former anti-secret organization, took care to keep their new plans quiet until they were strong enough to weather an attack from the secret societies. They secured, as their first meeting place, a room on Exchange Street, downtown.
Approval of the Rochester Group was obtained unanimously by Amherst in March of 1853, and by Williams in June. Hamilton was already in approval at the time; the founding date of the original Rochester chapter may be set at June, 1853.
In the winter of 1854-55, the building holding the Fraternity's room on Exchange street burned, and the chapter secured a new room in the Hamilton block on State Street. The Fraternity maintained prosperity in numbers until 1870, when the average number of Brothers dropped from twenty-five to twelve. However, these men made up for their deficiency in numbers with hard work; in the 1871 Commencement, Delta U earned twenty-two out of forty honors given to the students by the University. (All the secret societies combined earned only twenty, neutrals earned three.)
The Lafayette Chapter
Delta Upsilon was established on the campus of Lafayette College on May 30, 1885. The chapter unfortunately lost its charter in 1988. In the early part of 1989 the Delta Upsilon house was torn down to make room for the new student center. However, under the leadership of William Messick '68, Delta Upsilon re-colonized in the Spring of 1994 and moved into the recently vacated Phi Delta Theta house. More recently, in the fall of 2006, the chapter again moved, this time into the vacant house at 4 west campus Dr. In recent years Delta Upsilon has grown to over fifty men at Lafayette College. The brothers pride themselves on the four founding principles, and are continually working to apply those principles within the Fraternity, on the Lafayette College campus, and in the community.