National

Fraternity in Racist Video Has Roots in Antebellum South

Published

11 years ago

March 11, 2015

A sign post is seen outside the international headquarters of Sigma Alpha Epsilon in Evanston, Illinois on March 10, 2015. Sigma Alpha Epsilon’s international headquarters may be in Illinois, but the fraternity’s roots are firmly planted in the antebellum South. (AP Photo/Teresa Crawford)

ALLEN G. BREED, AP National Writer

Sigma Alpha Epsilon was born a few years before the Civil War in the antebellum South, the creation of a small group that set out to forge bonds among young men that would “hold them together for all time.”

The fraternity founded at the University of Alabama held its Southern heritage close. “We came up from Dixie land,” says a ditty from an old SAE songbook.

But nearly 160 years later, another song — this one chanted by members of the frat’s University of Oklahoma chapter and containing racial slurs and lynching references — hearkens back to the land of cotton and puts a new spotlight on the group’s history.

SAE officials insist the chant that resulted in suspension of the chapter is neither a sanctioned song nor is it taught to fraternity members.

If there are any other chapters that use the song, “we need to address that with those chapters and stop it immediately to stamp out this type of behavior,” SAE spokesman Brandon Weghorst said.

The lyrics “are so hateful and spiteful that it’s embarrassing to think that Sigma Alpha Epsilon members would even know the chant or how it goes, if they’ve heard it.”

The fraternity was also investigating reports of other SAE incidents that may have been tainted with racism, Weghorst said.

SAE began on the Tuscaloosa campus on March 9, 1856, a few months after Noble Leslie DeVotie outlined his vision to a close circle of friends during a stroll along the banks of the Black Warrior River.

The founders envisioned the members sharing a lifelong bond, according to a 1916 history of the fraternity by William C. Levere.

“So it came about that in the late hours of a stormy night, the friends met in the old southern mansion and by the flicker of dripping candles organized Sigma Alpha Epsilon,” Levere wrote.

More chapters were soon launched in Tennessee, North Carolina and Washington, D.C., at what is now George Washington University. But the founders were not interested in a national presence.

According to Levere, it was their intention “to confine the fraternity to the southern states.”

When a North Carolina chapter member raised the topic of a “Northern Extension,” charter member Thomas Chappell Cook — who later served as a surgeon in the Confederate army — responded that “the constant agitation of the slavery question was a barrier to northern chapters, as it would preclude the possibility of harmony.”

The Civil War soon put an end to the internal debate.

Because of the fighting, the fraternity’s charter was surrendered in 1861. The Washington City Rho chapter was the only one to emerge from the war intact. SAE would not return to its birthplace until 1886, after the Reconstruction-era ban on “secret societies” was relaxed and the school’s trustees, in Levere’s words, repealed “obnoxious anti-fraternity laws.”

In the meantime, the fraternity had granted its first Northern charter in 1883 to, of all schools, Pennsylvania College — the abolitionist institution now known as Gettysburg College.

The editors of the New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture call SAE “the first Greek-letter society founded in Dixie to take permanent root.”

In December 1930, the fraternity dedicated its international headquarters in the Chicago suburb of Evanston. But, like other fraternities North and South, SAE had not yet embraced racial diversity.

In his 2013 book, “The People’s Advocate,” attorney Daniel P. Sheehan claims credit for championing the bid of Tommy Williamson, who he wrote was the first black man to receive a nomination for membership in SAE.

Sheehan, who said he was social chairman of SAE’s Harvard chapter in 1966, said Williamson’s was the first name he called when it was time to vote for new members.

He and Williamson, a defensive lineman on the Crimson football team, both lived at Kirkland House.

On the first ballot, Sheehan said, Williamson received three “blackballs,” or negative votes.

Sheehan then announced he would blackball every other nominee until whoever had blocked Williamson “fessed up and gave us their reasons,” he wrote. It took six more ballots for a member to admit that he was voting against Williamson because he’d heard that the Piedmont, California, native dated white women.

Sheehan said Williamson’s nomination was approved on the seventh ballot. But when Sheehan told him how the vote had gone down, he wrote, Williamson declined the invitation.

Reached by telephone Tuesday, Williamson, who practices employment law in Washington, D.C., told The Associated Press that he wasn’t really interested in joining a fraternity, especially if some members didn’t want him.

“I didn’t want to be the sort of obsessive token negro,” he said.

Weghorst was unable to say whether Williamson was indeed the first black man formally invited to join a chapter because only within the last couple of years has the organization started to track the ethnicity of people who join, he said.

SAE has had its share of controversy in more recent years.

— In 1988, the founding chapter was suspended for violations of the university’s drug codes. The suspension was lifted two years later, only to be levied again in 1992 when the chapter failed to meet the goals outlined for reinstatement.

Most of the actions taken against SAE in the past have been for infractions of a non-racial nature. But the University of Oklahoma video is not an isolated incident.

— In October 2006, the University of Memphis chapter was investigated after a freshman member complained that his brothers made inappropriate remarks to and about his black girlfriend. Two members were later suspended.

— In February 2013, Washington University in St. Louis suspended its SAE chapter while investigating claims that pledges engaged in racially offensive behavior toward minorities.

— In December 2014, Clemson University suspended the frat after a gang-themed “Cripmas party” at which white members dressed in T-shirts bearing images of handcuffs and the late rapper Tupac Shakur.

Last year, SAE reached what it called “a historic milestone” — becoming the first large national fraternity to eliminate the pledge process.

“Instead, we have implemented a holistic education known as the True Gentleman Experience,” SAE says on its website. “It provides education throughout a member’s collegiate tenure and fosters both personal and professional development.”

___

Associated Press writers Kelly P. Kissel in Little Rock and Teresa Crawford in Chicago also contributed to this story.

___

Allen G. Breed is an AP national writer based in Raleigh, North Carolina. He can be reached at features@ap.org. Follow him on Twitter at https://twitter.com/AllenGBreed.

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Oakland Post: Week of April 1 – 7, 2026

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of April 1 – 7, 2026

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1 day ago

April 6, 2026

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Black Artists in America, Installation Three Wraps at the Dixon Gallery and Gardens

TRI-STATE DEFENDER — With 50+ paintings, sculptures and assemblages, the exhibit features artists like Varnette Honeywood from Los Angeles, whose pieces appeared in Bill Coby’s private collection (before they were auctioned off) and on “The Cosby Show.” Also included are works by Alonzo Davis, another Los Angeles artist who opened one of the first galleries there where Black Artists could exhibit.

Published

2 weeks ago

March 24, 2026

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By Candace A. Gray | Tri-State Defender

The tulips gleefully greet those who enter the gates at the Dixon Gallery & Gardens on an almost spring day. More than 650,000 bulbs of various hues are currently on display. And they are truly breathtaking.

Inside the gallery, and equally as breathtaking, is the “Black Artists in America, From the Bicentennial to September 11” exhibit, which runs through Sunday, March 29. This is the third installment of a three-part series that started years ago and illustrates part of the Black experience through visual arts in the 20th century.

“This story picks up where part two left off,’’ said Kevin Sharp, the Linda W. and S. Herbert Rhea director for the Dixon. “This era is when we really start to see the emergence of these important Black artists’ agency and freedom shine through. They start to say and express what they want to, and it was a really beautiful time.”

With 50+ paintings, sculptures and assemblages, the exhibit features artists like Varnette Honeywood from Los Angeles, whose pieces appeared in Bill Coby’s private collection (before they were auctioned off) and on “The Cosby Show.” Also included are works by Alonzo Davis, another Los Angeles artist who opened one of the first galleries there where Black Artists could exhibit.

“Though [Davis] was from LA, he actually lived in Memphis for a decade,” said Sharp. “He was a dean at Memphis College of Art, and later opened the first gallery in New York owned and operated by black curators.”

Another featured artist is former NFL player, Ernie Barnes. His work is distinctive. Where have you seen one of his most popular paintings, Sugar Shack? On the end scene and credits of the hit show “Good Times.” His piece Saturday Night, Durham, North Carolina, 1974 is in this collection.

Memphis native James Little’s “The War Baby: The Triptych” is among more than 50 works featured in “Black Artists in America, From the Bicentennial to September 11” at the Dixon Gallery & Gardens, the final installment of a three-part series highlighting the impact and evolution of Black artists through 2011.

The exhibit features other artists with Memphis ties, including abstract painter James Little, who was raised in a segregated Memphis and attended Memphis Academy of Art (before it was Memphis College of Art). He later moved to New York, became a teacher and an internationally acclaimed fixture in the art world in 2022 when he was named a Whitney Biennial selected artist at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York.

Other artists like Romare Bearden, who had a Southern experience but lived up North, were featured in all three installments.

“During this period of time, he was a major figure,” said Sharp. “He wrote one of the first books on the history of African American art during a time when there were more Black academics, art teachers, more Black everything!”

Speaking of Black educators, Sharp said the head curator behind this tri-part series and Dixon’s partner in the arts is Earnestine Jenkins, Ph.D., an art history professor at the University of Memphis, who also earned a Master of Arts degree from Memphis State University (now UofM). “We began working with Dr. Jenkins in 2018,” he said.

Sharp explained that it takes a team of curators, registrars, counterparts at other museums, and more, about three years to assemble an exhibit like this. It came together quite seamlessly, he added. Each room conjured up more jaw-dropping “wows” than the one before it. Each piece worked with the others to tell the story of Black people and their collective experience during this time period.

One of the last artists about whom Sharp shared information was Bettye Saar, who will turn 100 years old this year. She’s been working in Los Angeles for 80 years and is finally getting her due. Her medium is collages or assemblages, and an incredible work of hers is on display. She’s married to an artist and has two daughters, also artists.

The exhibit catalogue bears some of these artists’ stories, among other scholarly information.

The exhibit, presented by the Joe Orgill Family Fund for Exhibitions, is culturally and colorfully rich. It is a must see and admission to the Dixon is free.

Visit https://www.dixon.org/ to learn more.

Fun Facts: An original James Little design lives in the flooring of the basketball court at Tom Lee Park, and he makes and mixes his own paint colors.

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Grief, Advocacy, and Education: A Counselor Reflects on Black Maternal Health

SAN DIEGO VOICE & VIEWPOINT — Last month healthcare leaders, birth workers, and community members gathered to honor the legacy of Charleston native Dr. Janell Green Smith, a nurse-midwife and doctor of nursing practice who died in January from childbirth complications. She had participated in more than 300 births and specialized in helping Black women give birth safely.

Published

2 weeks ago

March 24, 2026

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By Jennifer Porter Gore | Word-In-Black | San Diego Voice and Viewpoint

In 2024, the number of U.S. mothers who died as a result of pregnancy or childbirth dropped compared to 2023. But while slightly fewer Black mothers died that year, they still had three times the mortality rate of white women.

South Carolina’s rates of maternal deaths outpaced even the national rates. In fact, the state’s overall rate of maternal deaths between 2019 and 2023 was higher than all but eight states and the District of Columbia.

Last month healthcare leaders, birth workers, and community members gathered to honor the legacy of Charleston native Dr. Janell Green Smith, a nurse-midwife and doctor of nursing practice who died in January from childbirth complications. She had participated in more than 300 births and specialized in helping Black women give birth safely.

Her death shocked the community and her colleagues who are determined to address concerns about Black maternal health. The event also covered the importance of protecting mental health during grief and of men’s role in solving the maternal health crisis.

As both a therapist and a father, Lawrence Lovell, a licensed professional counselor and founder of Breakthrough Solutions, discussed ways the event’s attendees could process their grief over Green Smith’s death. He also shared ways male partners can advocate for women’s maternal health during pregnancy and childbirth.

Lovell spoke not just as a therapist but also as a father whose own family had briefly crossed paths with Green Smith. The event, he said, emerged organically from a moment of collective mourning.

Despite the grief, “it was still, like, a really beautiful event, a much-needed event, and it almost felt like we were all giving each other a collective family hug,” says Lovell.

His connection to Green Smith, Lovell says, was brief but meaningful during his wife’s pregnancy with their second child. Green Smith was practicing at the same birthing center where they had their child. She began practicing in Greenville a short time later.Even that short connection carried significance for Lovell, given the small number of Black maternal health professionals.

Lovell did not initially plan to become a mental health practitioner; he chose the career path after graduating from college, when someone suggested he consider psychology. His interest deepened when he noticed how few Black men work in mental health.

“Being Black man and playing football in college, there weren’t a lot of people that look like me talking about mental health,” says Lovell. “[I wanted] to give people that look like me an opportunity to work with someone that looks like them.”

Working with Expectant and New Parents

Lovell often counsels couples preparing for parenthood by, helping partners understand what a successful pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum recovery look like. That often means helping women manage postpartum depression.

As a man, Lovell says, it’s “humbling” that a woman “just trusts me enough to work with me through their pregnancy or their postpartum recovery.”

In his work, Lovell has noticed how few men understand pregnancy before they experience it with their partner. Because early pregnancy symptoms are often invisible, he says, men may underestimate how much support a mom-to-be actually needs.

“Sometimes they may not realize they don’t know much about pregnancy and what to expect in those three trimesters,” Lovell says. “I tell a lot of the men that just because you can’t see [she’s pregnant] doesn’t mean that she won’t appreciate your intense support in that first trimester.”

Education about pregnancy and postpartum recovery, he says, can change how men support their partners.

Teaching Advocacy in the Delivery Room

Another major focus of Lovell’s counseling is preparing men to advocate for mothers during labor.

“Helping men understand what pregnancy looks like: what delivery is going to look like, and what are the realistic expectations that I should have of myself in postpartum,” he says.

Lovell encourages partners to be honest about their expectations for what will happen during delivery. He helps them prepare for the big day by discussing the birth plan and knowing how to quickly recognize problems. Clear communication, he says, prevents misunderstandings.

He regularly trains men to ask their partners detailed questions about their expectations during and after pregnancy. Advocacy in medical settings can be especially important and requires attention to details the mother may not be able to address.

“It’s always important to fine-tune things and truly understand what helps your partner feel most supported,” Lovell says. “Instead of guessing, you should ask.”

Lovell recalls a moment during the birth of his first child when he had to take that role.

During the delivery, “I felt like something wasn’t as sanitary as I’d like it to be,” he says. “I asked, ‘Hey, can you switch those out? Can you change your gloves?’”

Lovell has a succinct but powerful message he regularly shares with clients’ families, and he shared it with attendees at last month’s event.

“Just to believe women,” he says. “I’ve worked with different couples, and sometimes I’m not really sure that there’s enough empathy from the men.”

That includes how women express pain.

“If a woman says, ‘my pain is at a nine,’ just because how you would express yourself at a nine is different than how she’s expressing herself at [that level] doesn’t mean you shouldn’t believe her,” he says.

Empathy, he says, can change outcomes far beyond the delivery room.

“We’ve got to believe women when they’re talking about their experiences and their feelings and their pain,” he says. “I think there’s a lot that we can prevent if we empathize better.”