Phi Delta Theta House

Dean Ernest A. Vuilleumier reports to the Board of Trustees that the college was operating four separate buildings--Metzger Hall, the Gibbs House, the Parker House, and the Phi Delta Theta House--as women's dormitories. The dean viewed this situation as unsatisfactory and argued for "the very great need for a new dormitory for women." He urged the Board to make plans for the construction of a women's dormitory as soon as possible.

In the "Minutes of the Faculty Meeting of November 11, 1940," the Board of Deans reviewed a case of discipline in which the Phi Delta Theta house hosted a party "without proper chaperonage" followed by a jaunt in an automobile. The two female students who left Carlisle in the automobile received probation for the rest of academic year 1940-41 and were placed under "special regulations" in Metzger Hall. Another student, who did not leave in the automobile, only received probation "until Christmas."

As illustrated by Margaret MacGrefor in her interview she stated that in dormitory life, rules and regulations were implemented and monitored by proctors. Members of the opposite sex were not allowed inside the female dorimitories only in the parlors prior to curfew. When the womens relatives or acquaintances would come to pay them a visit the ladies were allowed to leave with them for the day only upon signing in and out. If you intended on staying out late or leave for the entire weekend special permission was required to be obtained.

In an interview, Helen Alexander Bachman (Class of 1946) claims that a majority of the students belonged to a sorority, fraternity, or other organization on campus. Bachman estimates that 99 percent of female students belonged to one of the four sororities. The fraternities owned houses while sorority women had apartments in Carlisle. Fraternities "dried up" during the war due to the absence of men. Sororities, however, had meetings, social functions, bridge parties, suppers, and community service events.