Beta Beta

Beta Beta Chapter was founded at St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York on September 26, 1881. The chapter closed in 1903 after the Fraternity chose to withdraw charters from small universities. The chapter was then recognized as Zeta Phi, a local fraternity. It was reinstalled as Beta Beta Deuteron in 1915. Initially, the fraternity custom was to name a new chapter after a closed one, so that all 24 letters of the Greek alphabet were always in use. Because of this custom, the Chapter is called simply Beta in early records. This practice ended in 1890 when Convention delegates voted to affix Beta to the name of a chapter to indicate it was the second and to affix Gamma on the second round, then Delta, and so on. The chapter at St. Lawrence was the second chapter to be known as Beta and, after 1890, it became known as Beta Beta.