The Founding Fathers of Sigma Phi Epsilon |
Each of the Founding Fathers
were balanced men who went on to excel in their own professional fields. They
acted on their ideals and goals and set high standards for all brothers to
follow. They are an inspiration today for excellence in all walks of life.
 Carter Ashton Jenkens
was born in Oxford, North
Carolina, on April 9, 1882, and received his early education in
New Jersey. He
graduated from Richmond College in June, 1902, and then taught for two years
at Chase City, Virginia,
Military
Academy and Richmond
Preparatory. He received a baccalaureate degree in the ministry at Crozer
Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania, and served for more than 20 years as a
pastor in churches in Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond,
finally to become an evangelist and conduct revivals throughout the
United
States. His gift for inspiring oratory was so
outstanding that the famed evangelist "Billy Sunday" is reported on one occasion
to have exclaimed, "If only the Almighty had blessed me with the voice of Carter
Jenkens!" His twilight years
were spent in Louisville,
Kentucky, where he died on July 23,
1952.

Benjamin
Donald Gaw came to Richmond College, where he worked his way through
school, acting as pastor of the East End Baptist Church of Richmond, to graduate
in 1906.
He had come
from Stuart's Draft, Virginia, where he was born on August 20,
1870. He married and later received the bachelor of divinity degree at Colgate.
For six years thereafter, he was pastor at the West Washington Baptist Church,
Washington, D.C., and in 1917 was called to the First Baptist
Church in Durham, North
Carolina.
He died in Washington, D.C. on January 10, 1919, from pneumonia. He
is buried in Montgomery,
Maryland.

William Hugh Carter was
born near Danville in Pittsylvania County, Virginia, February 2, 1878. His family moved
to Salem, where
he attended the public schools. For one year, he taught in a public school in
Roanoke County, Virginia, and in September 1897, entered Richmond College to prepare for the Baptist
ministry. After being out of college for one year, he received his B.A. degree
from Richmond
College in June of
1902.
Founder
Carter's campus activities included debate, YMCA, and varsity basketball. He
became a teacher at Southside
Academy in Chase City,
Virginia in 1902-1903 and was principal of the
Chase
City Grade
School for the next two years. During this
three-year period, he served as the editor of the Chase City Progress. In
September, 1905, he entered Crozer Theological Seminary, where Jenkens had gone,
and received the bachelor of divinity degree in May, 1908. He then became pastor
of the First Baptist Church, Winchester, Virginia, for six-and-a-half years. Subsequent
pastorates were at Hertford, North Carolina, three-and-a-half years; Crewe, Virginia, ten-and-a-half years; and Marion
Virginia, 18 years.
Retiring from
active pastorates, he served as field worker for the Sunday School Department of
the Varina Baptist Board of Missions and Education.
Brother Carter died in
Salem, Virginia on January 5, 1971 at the age of
92.

William Andrew Wallace,
the second of the roommates at Ryland Hall, was invited to join that group by
Gaw, his roommate. He came from Gaw's hometown, Stuart's Draft, where he was
born on May 7, 1882. He did not graduate but transferred to the Medical College
of Virginia for his M.D., on which campus he launched the dormant Virginia Beta
Chapter (now Virginia Commonwealth University), becoming its first member. By
this act, Sigma Phi Epsilon's expansion began.
He left the
Medical College for an internship in the Boston Floating Hospital, which he left for another internship in a
hospital in Richmond.
Later, in 1908, he
located in Spartanburg,
South Carolina, continuing in
practice to become one of the best-known medical practitioners in the state, and
a devoted SigEp until his death in 1929.

Thomas Temple Wright was
born at Locust Grove, Caroline
County, Virginia, May 21, 1883. He was tutored at
home, entered Richmond College in 1900, received the B.A. in 1904, and was
graduated from the Engineering
College at Cornell University, in 1907.
Wright roomed
with Jenkens at the "Cottage." His intimate friends knew him as "Those," after
the abbreviated form of his name. The fifth member of the Fraternity, he was one
of the two founders who returned to college in September, 1902, and as treasurer
of the group, signed the corporate charter secured from the Commonwealth of
Virginia on October 22,
1902.
Wright
started his professional career as a United
States surveyor with the Mississippi River Commission in
Vicksburg, Mississippi. He later became a railroad civil
engineer, first with the Canadian Pacific Railroad in Ottawa, Canada, then with
the Canadian Northern Railroad on construction in Ontario, and finally with the
Baltimore and Ohio. In 1917, "Those," on leave from the B & O, was
construction engineer for the United States Army Camp Taylor at Louisville, Kentucky. The following year, he became head
of the Warsaw and Fredericksburg offices of the Henrico Lumber Company,
making his home in Warsaw,
Virginia. In 1933, he and his
brothers formed Wright Brothers, Inc., with offices in Richmond, West Point, Tappahannock, and Philadelphia. He continued
to be active with this firm for many years.
He died on February
15, 1958.

William Lazell
Phillips devoted virtually all the mature years of his life to Sigma Phi
Epsilon. A study of the leadership pattern of the founding group reveals that he
is the one titan after Jenkens. The latter said to his brothers, "This is how we
must build our Fraternity." Phillips built it. Born in Normal, Illinois, in 1873,
William L. Phillips came to Richmond College in September, 1901, to study law
and the Bible. He attended one year, dropped out a year, and then returned. His
pursuit of legal studies gave way to his devotion to Sigma Phi Epsilon and he
never graduated.
The first
Conclave at Richmond College in December, 1903, authorized the
establishment of the Journal and appointed Uncle Billy as its first editor. The
first issue, March, 1904, "Published by the Grand Council in the interest of the
Fraternity," reveals that Uncle Billy was determined to make the Journal carry
news from all chapters and thus add dignity and strength to his young
Fraternity.
In addition
to his work as the first Journal editor, he played some baseball and football
(not on the college team), attended the Philogian Literary Society, and attended
classes in law. He was the first secretary of Virginia Alpha in
1901-1902.
A complete
record of his professional career tells the story of his work for Sigma Phi
Epsilon: Editor of the Journal, 1904-1912, 1919-1921; business manager of the
Journal, 1904-1911, 1919-1942; member, Ritual Committee, 1907; editor of
membership directories, 1915 and 1921; trustee of the Endowment Fund 1925-1939,
1944-1949; trustee of the national Headquarters, 1927-1942; trustee of the
Student Loan Fund, 1930-1940; Grand Secretary, 1908-1942; Grand Secretary
Emeritus, 1942-1956; Grand Vice President, 1943; Grand President, 1944; National
Interfraternity Conference, founder, 1909; Vice Chairman, 1929-1930; member, War
Committee, 1942; a founder and Chairman of College Fraternity Secretaries
Association 1939-1940.
Uncle Billy
passed away at his home on June 20, 1956, and left his personal estate to the
Fraternity, which founded the Phillips Fund within the Sigma Phi Epsilon
Educational Foundation. That fund provides scholarships for members of the
University of
Richmond
chapter.
He loved his
Fraternity intensely and had attended every one of the 24 Conclaves from the
first at Richmond College, 1903, to Cincinnati, 1955. William L. Phillips must be
numbered among the first handful of truly great builders of the American college
fraternity system. No one has achieved a greater record.

Lucian
Baum Cox was born on November 13, 1879, in Princess Anne
County, Virginia. He attended a one-room public
school, and worked at his father's farm and sawmill. In September, 1898, he
entered Richmond
College, first as an
academic student and later as a law student, where he received a bachelor of law
degree in June, 1902.
As an
undergraduate, he taught Bible class in Calvary Baptist Church on Sunday mornings and to a group
of inmates at the Virginia Penitentiary in the afternoons. In July, 1902, he
began the practice of law in Norfolk, Virginia.
Founder Cox
wrote the application for the corporate charter for Sigma Phi Epsilon. In 1939,
he published his first edition of Titles to Land in Virginia, and a second
edition was published in 1947. This book was followed in 1951 by his work on
Principles and Procedure in Equity.
Brother Cox died in
Norfolk, Virginia on June 10, 1971, at the age of
91.

Richard Spurgeon Owens
was a minister's son, and was born October 28, 1880, in Hempstead,
King George County, Virginia.
When he graduated from Richmond in 1904, he spent four years at
Colgate Theological Seminary, to become a minister, graduating in 1907. His
career in the ministry called him to Baptist churches in Washington, D.C.,
Roanoke, Virginia, and for four years, 1917-1921, as an instructor
in Fishburn Military Academy in Waynesboro, Virginia.
Before his death on
July 6, 1950, he was trustee of the University of Richmond, Bluefield College, and also of the Baptist Orphanage in
Salem, Virginia.

Edgar
Lee Allen was born on January 6, 1880, in Virginia.
He attended
private schools in King and Queen County. After three liberal arts years at
Richmond, he
completed graduate work in law in 1902. He moved to Birmingham, Alabama, in October, 1902.
After taking up
residence in Birmingham, Founder Allen practiced law in that
city steadily, serving as a judge in various courts until his death on March 21,
1945.

Robert Alfred
McFarland was born on a farm near Oxford, North
Carolina, on January 31, 1876. He attended
Granville County public schools; three years at Bethel Hill
Institute, North Carolina; four years at
Richmond College received a B.S. in 1902; received a bachelors
of theology degree from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary at Louisville in 1908, and an honorary doctor of divinity
degree from the University of Richmond in 1921.
McFarland
made the motion to found Sigma Phi Epsilon.
McFarland
held important pastorates in three states. In North
Carolina, he was a member of the Baptist State Board, a trustee of
the Baptist Orphanage and Wake Forest
College, and was vice
president of the Baptist State Convention. In Virginia, he served as a member of the Baptist State
Board, a trustee of the Baptist
Hospital, the Fork Union Military Academy, and the Southern Baptist State
Convention. McFarland was once written up in a London journal as a "representative" minister of the
United
States.
He died on March 14,
1960.

Frank Webb Kerfoot, who
died in an accident on August 29, 1918, was another Baptist preacher.
A native
Virginian, he was born October 2, 1876, in Buckland, Prince William County, and at Richmond was a member of the Class of 1902.
At the time of his
death, he was a chaplain in the Army. He had been pastor of parishes in
Buckingham and Middlesex Counties, and Chatham,
Virginia; Nowata, Oklahoma, and
Fort Smith, Arkansas.

Thomas Vaden McCaul was
born in Charles City County,
Virginia on November 25, 1878. He
attended Richmond public schools, graduated from
Richmond High
School, and entered Richmond College as a pre-law student in February,
1898. In September of that year, Uncle Tom returned to Richmond College as a ministerial student, being
convinced of a call to preach. He received his B.A. from Richmond College in June, 1902; the masters of theology from
the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in 1905, and the M.A. from the
University of
Virginia in 1908. The
honorary degree of doctor of divinity was conferred upon him by the
University of Richmond and Stetson University.
While at Richmond College, Uncle Tom was active in debates
and oratorical contests. He won the writer's medal at the University of Virginia in 1907. Uncle Tom served as the
first president of Virginia Alpha in 1901-1902 and wrote the Fraternity's first
song, "Our Fraternity," in 1902. In the fall of 1902, he visited Bethany
College, West Virginia; Washington and
Jefferson College,
Pennsylvania; and
West
Virginia University and formed a nucleus
for chapters in all three. He helped establish Virginia Eta at the
University of Virginia in 1907 and Florida Alpha at the University of Florida in 1925. He was appointed National
Chaplain in 1947 and served until 1959.
Uncle Tom
served as pastor of Baptist churches in Kentucky, Virginia,
South Carolina, and Florida. After more than
2 years as pastor of the First Baptist Church of Gainesville, Florida, he
retired on January 1, 1949. He remained in Gainesville, frequently looking in on his young
Florida Alpha brothers. He continued to attend Conclaves, his last being the
32nd Grand Chapter in Atlanta in 1971.
On November 18, 1972,
he died peacefully in Gainesville at the age of 93. He was the
Fraternity's last remaining founding father. |