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Elihu Club

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This article is about the senior society at Yale. For other uses, see Elihu (disambiguation).
Elihu Club
Founded1903; 121 years ago (1903)
Yale University
TypeSenior society
AffiliationIndependent
StatusActive
ScopeLocal
Chapters1
NicknameElihu
Headquarters175 Elm Street
New Haven, Connecticut 06511
United States
Websitewww.elihu.org

Elihu Club or Elihu is the fourth oldest senior society at Yale University, New Haven, CT.[1][2][3] It was founded in 1903 and takes its name from Elihu Yale.[4][5][3]

History

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The Elihu Club was founded by eleven students in 1903 as an "open senior society", rather than a secret society.[6][7][5][8] At the time, this was considered in "variance with accepted traditions" at Yale and "an interesting democratic innovation".[8] its name from Elihu Yale who was the primary benefactor of Yale College.[3] Its purpose is: "To foster among its members, by earnest work and good fellowship a stronger affection for Yale; a broader view of undergraduate life and its aims; a deeper and more helpful friendship for one another; and to give its members, after graduation, an additional tie to bind them to Yale and each other."[9][3]

The Elihu Club of New Haven incorporated with the State of Connecticut in June 1903.[10] The first delegation of tapped members was from the class of 1904 and included:[11]

  • Arthur Williams Allen
  • Edwin Clapp
  • Edward Chappel Ely
  • Thomas Robert Gaines
  • Chauncey Shafer Goodrich
  • Harry Thomas Hamilton
  • Charles Simonton McCain
  • Carleton Shaw
  • Henry Hamlin Stebbins Jr.
  • George Frederick Victor Jr.
  • Paul Bessal Welles

In October 1903, Elihu Club added six additional members from the class of 1904, including seniors Coleman Curtis, Everett Dominick, Harry L. Foote, Joseph H. Holmes, Lawrence Mason, and Robert L. Smitley.[12] For the 1904 to 1905 academic year, the club rented the home of Mrs. Francis G. Beach on Wall Street.[13]

In 1911, the club purchased a colonial-era house which looks out on the New Haven Green.[14][15] It is considered a landed society because it owns a building on campus.[16] Like the other societies, the organization's building is typically closed to non-members.

While similar to Skull and Bones, Scroll and Key and Wolf's Head societies in charter and function, Elihu favors privacy over secrecy and is considered a "left-wing" society.[5][17] Because it allows all members of the junior class to interview for membership, the Yale Daily News notes that, "Elihu is considered to be less prestigious."[17] However, in May 1912, three men turned down invitations to secret societies in favor of Elihu Club, including baseball player Harold Carhart, football player Elmer McDevitt, and Edward Stevens.[18] In the spring of 1913, the sophomore class at Yale held a protest against secret societies; Elihu denied suspicions that it started the student protest.[19]

Elihu's normal meetings are held each Thursday and Sunday of the academic year.[20] Its activities are similar to that of the other landed senior secret societies: personal histories or biographies and perspectives are shared among the current delegates.[21] Its programs also include topical essays on pertinent issues, personal bonding time, and group reflection activities.

By 1982, Elihu gained a reputation for admitting racial minorities.[22] In May 1982, the fifteen members of Elihu refused to tap any new members because of a dispute with the alumni who wanted to start charging new members $350.[22] Elihu Club began admitting women in 1971.[23]

Starting in 2002, the club hosts the annual Elihu Yale Lecture which features notable speakers.[3] Architect, planner, and Elihu members Alexander Garvin presented the first lecture in 2002.[24][25] The 2005 lecture was delivered by actor Sam Waterston, also an Elihu member.[26][3]

Elihu's house in the early 20th century

Symbols

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Members of Elihu Club received a pin.[20]

Club house

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Elihu's house

Elihu Club is housed in a three-story white clapboard house built between 1762 and 1776 at 175 Elm Street.[14][15] This house is the oldest of all of Yale's secret society buildings, and purportedly one of the oldest original structures in the United States still in regular use. Its brick basement is older still, constructed in the early 17th century, and later frequented by colonists sympathetic to the English cause when it became known as the Tory Tavern, a central locale of the Revolutionary War.[27] In 1781, the town of New Haven confiscated the building from its Loyalist owner, Nicholas Callahan, for his activities.[27][15]

The club expanded the Federal style building to the rear several times and now includes 12,726 square feet (1,182.3 m2).[2] The building is among the largest of the societies, belying the modest clapboard facade. It contains two single guest rooms in addition to beds for all the current undergraduate members, as well as a large formal meeting room, a library, a formal dining room, and an informal 'tap room' in the basement. The club also has a section of the old Yale Fence in its basement, a relic from the famous structure removed in 1888.

The building has windows, though they are blinded.

Membership

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Originally, Elihu had no limit on the number of members that could be tapped in a given year; its only rule was that these men not be a member of the other secret societies: Scroll and Key, Skull and Bones, and Wolf's Head.[8] As a result, Elihu waited to invite its new members after Tap Day for the other societies.[8] However, its founders estimated that between ten and twenty students would be tapped each year, along with worthy Yale graduates from the past twenty or thirty years.[28] In May 1920, the club changed its recruitment policy and participated in Tap Day with the secret societies.[29]

Starting as an all-male organization, Elihu now also has female members.[3] Annually, sixteen rising seniors are elected into the membership of Elihu during the spring tap process.[9] Selection is performed behind closed doors, in keeping with the other major societies. The society invites all members of the junior class to participate in its interview process.[17] However, consideration for membership in Elihu is given to those juniors in the college who are nominated by undergraduate and alumni members.[9]

From its earliest days, the Elihu Club has favored members who leaned toward literary pursuits, acting, teaching, and the law. Elihu Society's taps among the Yale class of 1914, for instance, included Rufus King, president of the Yale Dramatic Association, and Newbold Noyes Jr., chairman of the Yale Literary Magazine.[1]

For some, Elihu was appealing because it was different from Yale's secret societies. Joseph Lieberman was courted by Skull and Bones, even though he wrote editorials critical of the society in the Yale Daily News. Lieberman wrote, "Heresy of all heresies, it would be wonderful if, as a symbolic gesture, the societies someday put windows in their buildings. No other institution seems to separate the haves from the have-nots so forcefully in the eyes of students."[30] Lieberman rejected Bones in favor of Elihu, whose building had windows.[31][32] Jacob Weisberg, was offered membership in Skull and Bones by Senator John Kerry. Weisberg declined, citing Bones' exclusion of women.[33] Weisberg was persuaded by Robert G. Kaiser to join Elihu instead.[34]

Notable members

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  • The sharing of personal stories became a plot device in a movie directed by Elihu member Alan Hruska (1955), who jettisoned a career as a trial lawyer to become a film director. Hruska's 2009 film Reunion explored a mythical reunion of fellow society members some 23 years after graduation, and was loosely inspired by a gathering of his Elihu delegation.[49][50]
  • Campus tradition maintains that Elihu has the original papers of the author James Fenimore Cooper, even drafts of his epic novel The Last of the Mohicans. Cooper's great-grandson James Fenimore Cooper Jr. (1892–1918) was a member of Elihu's 1913 delegation.
  • In a March 2000 essay on Yale's societies, Jacques Leslie recalled learning he would be tapped for Skull and Bones. "I was leaning towards Elihu, the sole above-ground society that was headquartered in an actual frame house with windows." When the Bonesmen arrived to tap Leslie, he shouted "Reject!" The surprised expression on the Bonesman's face was printed on the following day's second front page of The New York Times with the caption "Skull was first but he chose Elihu."[41]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b c d "Post-Tap Day Honors; Elihu Club at Yale Gets Prominent Juniors Who Were Passed Over". The New York Times. 1913-05-20. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  2. ^ a b "Yale Elihu Club". Kenneth Boroson Architects. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g Garza, Joe (2023-05-06). "Yale Has More Secret Societies Than You Realize. Here's The History". Grunge. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  4. ^ Papers of the New Haven Colony Historical Society. New Haven Colony Historical Society. 1882.
  5. ^ a b c "New Yale Senior Club; Feature About the Elihu Is That It Is Not a Secret Society" (PDF). The New York Times. March 21, 1903. p. 7. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  6. ^ Schiff, Judith Ann. (September/October 2004) "How The Secret Societies Got That Way", Yale Alumni Magazine, Yale Alumni Magazine Archived April 4, 2005, at the Wayback Machine
  7. ^ Yale Sheffield Monthly, Vol. 20, Sheffield Scientific School, Yale University, Oct. 1913–June 1914, New Haven, CT
  8. ^ a b c d "Yale Seniors Make an Interesting Democratic Innovation in the Social Life of that University: Yale's New Society. 'Elihu' is Started on a Basis New at this University". New-York Tribune. 1903-04-05. p. 17. Retrieved 2023-07-12 – via Newspapers.com.
  9. ^ a b c "Welcome to Elihu". www.elihu.org. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  10. ^ "New Corporations". The Morning Journal-Courier. New Haven, Connecticut. 1903-06-13. p. 6. Retrieved 2023-07-12 – via Newspapers.com.
  11. ^ "The Elihu Club". Hartford Courant. Hartford, Connecticut. 1903-06-03. p. 1. Retrieved 2023-07-12 – via Newspapers.com.
  12. ^ "New Yale Society: Six Men Elected to the Elihu Club". Hartford Courant. Hartford, Connecticut. 1903-10-13. p. 13. Retrieved 2023-07-12 – via Newspapers.com.
  13. ^ "Personal Paragraphs: Items of Interest Concerning New Haven People". The Morning Journal-Courier. New Haven, Connecticut. 1905-05-08. p. 6. Retrieved 2023-07-12 – via Newspapers.com.
  14. ^ a b Brown, Elizabeth Mills (1976-01-01). New Haven, a Guide to Architecture and Urban Design. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-01993-3.
  15. ^ a b c Khederian, Robert (2018-06-21). "Tomb raiders: The clubhouses of Yale's secret societies". Curbed. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  16. ^ Branch, Mark Alden (July 2014). "Open secrets". Yale Alumni Magazine. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  17. ^ a b c "Secret societies: tombs and tradition". Yale Daily News. 2002-06-30. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  18. ^ a b "Elihu Club Elections". Hartford Courant. Hartford, Connecticut. 1911-05-24. p. 1. Retrieved 2023-07-12 – via Newspapers.com.
  19. ^ "Elihu Club Elects at Yale: Denies Starting Insurrection Against Secret Societies". The Sun. New York, New York. 1913-05-20. p. 7. Retrieved 2023-07-12 – via Newspapers.com.
  20. ^ a b Hobbs, Jeff (2015-07-28). The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace: A Brilliant Young Man Who Left Newark for the Ivy League. Simon and Schuster. p. 180. ISBN 978-1-4767-3191-9 – via Google Books.
  21. ^ Hobbs, Jeff (2015-07-28). The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace: A Brilliant Young Man Who Left Newark for the Ivy League. Simon and Schuster. p. 193. ISBN 978-1-4767-3191-9 – via Google Books.
  22. ^ a b Freedman, Samuel G.; Times, Special To the New York (1982-04-16). "'Tap Day': Fading Bit of Old Yale". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  23. ^ Miller-Bernal, Leslie; Poulson, Susan L. (2004). Going Coed: Women's Experiences in Formerly Men's Colleges and Universities, 1950-2000. Vanderbilt University Press. p. 130. ISBN 978-0-8265-1449-3 – via Google Books.
  24. ^ Baker, Donna (November 5, 2002) "Alexander Garvin, Chief Planner for Rebuilding Lower Manhattan, Will Speak at Yale", Yale University for Public Affairs Archived 2010-07-14 at the Wayback Machine
  25. ^ a b Branch, Mark Alden (May 2001). "A Man with Plans: New York City Olympics planner Alexander Garvin has made a career of figuring out why some urban renewal efforts work and others don't. And for two generations, he has taken Yale undergraduates along for the ride". Yale Alumni Magazine. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  26. ^ a b Bicks, Alexandra (January 28, 2005) "Law and Order' Star Returns to Yale for Tlk". The Yale Daily News Accessed July 12, 2023.
  27. ^ a b Project, Federal Writers' (1938). Connecticut: A Guide to Its Roads, Lore and People. US History Publishers. p. 235. ISBN 978-1-60354-007-0 – via Google Books.
  28. ^ "Saving of an Old Yale Building". Buffalo Morning Express. Buffalo, New York. 1903-04-16. p. 10. Retrieved 2023-07-12 – via Newspapers.com.
  29. ^ "Tap Day Honors 57 Yale Juniors: Elihu Club Joins Three Others in Day's Campus Operation". Hartford Courant. Hartford, Connecticut. 1920-05-21. p. 2. Retrieved 2023-07-12 – via Newspapers.com.
  30. ^ Yale Daily News, 6 November, 3006[permanent dead link‍]
  31. ^ a b Courtney, Nadine Jolie (2016-08-09). "The Most Exclusive Student Clubs of the Ivy League". Town & Country. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  32. ^ a b Herrmann, Robert (2004-04-01). Sir John Templeton: Supporting Scientific Research For Spiritual Discoveries. Templeton Foundation Press. ISBN 978-1-932031-68-3.
  33. ^ Alex Beam, "The Bones in Kerry's Closet," The Boston Globe, June 25, 2002, pp. E1+.
  34. ^ a b Robbins, Alexandra (2002). Secrets of the Tomb: Skull and Bones, the Ivy League, and the Hidden Paths of Power. Boston: Little, Brown. ISBN 0-316-72091-7, p. 112
  35. ^ Messer, David W. (2009-12-28). Henry Roe Cloud: A Biography. Hamilton Books. p. 41. ISBN 978-0-7618-4919-3 – via Google Books.
  36. ^ "James C. Goodale Biography". www.jamesgoodale.net. Retrieved 2023-07-13.
  37. ^ "Biography of Rowland Hazard". Rhode Island Genealogy. 2019-09-24. Retrieved 2023-07-13.
  38. ^ "Lloyd Kaufman – Curriculum Vitae » Lloyd Kaufman". Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  39. ^ "Kaiser, Robert G(reeley) 1943- | Encyclopedia.com". Encyclopedia | CENGAGE. Contemporary Authors, New Revision Series. Retrieved 2023-07-13.
  40. ^ Sylvester, John Andrew (1967). Arthur Bliss Lane: American Career Diplomat. University of Wisconsin--Madison. p. 3 – via Google Books.
  41. ^ a b Leslie, Jacques (2000-03-01). "Smirk from the past". Salon. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  42. ^ Baum, Geraldine (2000-10-20). "Moderating and Moralizing, Lieberman Toils in the Center". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  43. ^ Kearney, Brendan. (February 4, 2003) "To classmates, Lieberman's presidential bid is 'no surprise'" Yale Daily News, Archived 10 February 2013 at archive.today
  44. ^ Robinson, Paul (1999). Gay Lives: Homosexual Autobiography from John Addington Symonds to Paul Monette. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-72180-4.
  45. ^ "Edward Lyman Munson, M.D., Preventive Medicine". Online Archive of California. San FranciscoUniversity of California: In Memoriam. 1947. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  46. ^ Schenkel, Ben (March 30, 2012). "Tapping in to Yale's secret societies | UWire". Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  47. ^ David Shire, Buffalo Music Hall of Fame, buffalomusic.org Archived 2011-09-29 at the Wayback Machine
  48. ^ Olson, James C. (2003). Stuart Symington: A Life. University of Missouri Press. p. 10. ISBN 978-0-8262-6459-6.
  49. ^ "Morristown movies: Toxic love and the secret societies of Yale". nj. 2009-02-05. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
  50. ^ Lee, Nathan (2009-03-06). "Ivy League Blues". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-07-12.
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