Kappa Sigma, as one of the oldest and largest fraternities in North America, believes in the total development of today’s college man, fostering a values-based fraternity environment on our principles of Fellowship, Leadership, Scholarship, and Service.
“The Star and the Crescent shall not be worn by every man,
But only by him who is worthy to wear it.
He must be a gentleman… a man of honor and courage…
a man of zeal, yet humble…an intelligent man… a man of truth…
One who tempers action with wisdom and,
above all else, one who walks in the light of God.”
The purpose of Kappa Sigma is to achieve the total development of a better man: academically, culturally, civically, and as a successful leader and role model to others. Kappa Sigma provides strong scholarship support, self-improvement opportunities, and an active social life for brothers.
History
Kappa Sigma’s original founding dates back to 1400 in Bologna, Italy, a city of architecture guarded by twelve gates and surrounded by soaring towers. It was then that Manuel Chrysoloras, a Greek emissary teaching at the renowned University of Bologna, formed a society with some of his students for the protection of one another against the unscrupulous governor of the city, Baldassarre Cossa. Cossa was known for sending robbers to attack and steal from foreigners. The new formed society incorporated secret signs, words, and weapons for protection from infiltration. Their ideals, formed over time and embodied in a ritual, transformed them from a group of men to a true brotherhood – the Fellowship of Kappa Sigma.
On December 10, 1869, the order of Kappa Sigma saw its first day in the United States as a result of the efforts of five students attending the University of Virginia: William Grigsby McCormick, George Miles Arnold, John Covert Boyd, Frank Courtney Nicodemus, and Edmund Law Rogers (appearing in this respective order below). These five students are known to Kappa Sigmas as “The Five Friends and Brothers.” Together they gathered in McCormick’s room at 46 East Lawn and planted the seeds of our brotherhood by binding themselves together by an oath and preserving their union with secret work. This Ritual made them brothers for life.
The Five Friends and Brothers of Kappa Sigma
Stephen Alonzo Jackson is regarded as possibly the most important man in Kappa Sigma’s history. Through his efforts a struggling local fraternity became a strong national organization. He was the architect of our Ritual, writer of our Constitution, and was our first Worthy Grand Master.
