THE PI BETA PHI EDITION
Kansas University Weekly.
VOLUME II.
NUMBER 23.
SATURDAY, MARCH 16, 1901.
The Lucinda Smith Buchan Memorial Scholarship
DURING the winter of 1896, the Lawrence alumnae of the Pi Beta Phi fraternity, about forty in number, organized themselves into a club. The club was established with the thought of perpetuating college and fraternity friendships, and of keeping in close touch with the active fraternity and university life. It was not long, however, before the members felt that, in order to make the club a real success, a definite work of some sort must be undertaken. What the nature of this work should be was a difficult matter to decide, and many suggestions were made only to be rejected as impracticable.
Finally the idea came as an inspiration that the Pi Beta Phi alumnae could establish and maintain a Kansas University scholarship for the benefit of university girls. At first thought, the establishing of a two hundred dollar-scholarship seemed a gigantic undertaking, but the idea once conceived, was bound to be carried out, for it was a beautiful idea, and one worth working hard for. It was realized at once that to raise a fund large enough to support a two hundred dollar scholarship, would be the work of several years and so the club decided to offer its scholarship, for the present at least, as a loan.
The work of raising the money was begun, and in a short time, more than two hundred dollars was secured from the Lawrence alumnae alone. When this amount was on hand, the club felt that the Pi Beta Phi scholarship was an assured thing, and thereupon appointed a permanent committee to administer the fund, and made rules to govern the awarding of it. These rules are:
1. The scholarship shall be awarded
(a.) to a junior or senior girl in the school of arts :
(b.) to a lower class-woman, if exceptional reasons exist for awarding it to her:
(c.) Other things being equal, a Pi Beta Phi is given the preference.
3. This note after maturity shall bear interest at five per cent.
2. The money is to be secured by a note signed by the recipient and by one other responsible person.
(a) —The note given by a senior shall mature two years from date.
(b.) When given by any other than a senior it shall mature three years from date.
Just as the plans for the scholarship were taking shape, the sad news of the sudden and tragic death of Lucinda Smith Buchan reached Lawrence. To the Pi Beta Phi fraternity, her death brought especial sorrow, for she had been a loyal and ardent worker in that fraternity both in chapter and national affairs, and was much loved and honored. Out of this sorrow, grew the idea
of calling the new scholarship the Lucinda Smith Buchan Memorial Scholarship, as a fitting monument to her memory.
The scholarship has now been established nearly two years. Two girls have been enabled to continue their university work by means of it, one of them a member of the Pi Beta Phi, the other a non-fraternity girl. During these two years, the scholarship has not only held the interest and enthusiasm of the Alumnae Club, but has had the approval and support of the university and Lawrence people.
The funds have been increased in various ways; by subscriptions from members of the fraternity, by gifts amounting to over one hundred dollars from outside friends, and by entertainments As a chief means of raising money, it is the idea of the committee to provie one first class entertainment each year, an entertainment which Lawrence will be glad to support, not merely because it is for the benefit of a worthy cause, but because it is good in itself. In 1900, the Persian Garden concert was given for the benefit of this fund in 1901, the Elbert Hubbard lecture.
The history of the Pi Beta Phi scholarship in
the University of Kansas goes to show that the scholarship idea is an excellent one for a college fraternity to take up. It benefits both the university and the fraternity, and helps to solve the problem which faces every fraternity of how to retain the interest of its alumni.
The Pi Beta Phi Alumnae Club in Lawrence is bound to be a permanent organization as long as long as the scholarship is maintained in the university. The work for it keeps the alumnae together, while it at the same time impresses upon the active chapter the worth and dignity of the fraternity to which it belongs.
H. B. S.
NEW ORLEANS MARDI GRAS 1901.
It was on the last Monday of the Carnival Lundi Gras 1699, you remember, that Iberville made his way through the formidable p lisades and superstitious terrors that guarded the mouth of the Mississippi. As he lay that evening on the rush covered bank of the River, reposing from his fatigues and adventures, the stars coming out over head, the camp-fires lighted near him, the savoury fragrance of supper spreading upon the air, he thought, according to his journal, of the gay rout going on at that moment in Paris, and contrasted his day with that of his frolicking friends. And he exulted in his superior pleasure, for he said it was gallant work, discovering unknown shores in boats that were not large enough to keep the sea in a gale, and yet were too large to land on the shelving shores where they grounded and stranded a half mile out. The next morning on Mardi Gras he formally took possession of the country, and the first name he gave on the Mississippi was in honor of the day, to a little stream—the Bayou Mardi Gras, as it is still printed on the last, as on the first map of the region. After such a beginning and with such a coincidence of festivals, it is not surprising to find traces of Mardi Gras celebrations throughout all the early Louisiana chronicles. The boisterous buffooneries of the gay little garrison at Mobile generally made Ash Wednesday a day for military as well as clerical discipline, and the same record was maintained in New
the same record was maintained in New Orleans. As for New Orleans it is safe to say that h r streets saw not the sober qualities of life any earlier than the travesty of it, and that since her alignment by Pauger, they have never missed their yearly affluence of Mardi Gras masks and dominoes; nor from the earliest records, have the masks and dominoes missed their yearly balls.
Critical European travellers aver that they recognize by a thousand shades in the coloring of the New Orleans carnival, the Spanish rather than the French, citing as evidence the innocent and respectful fooleries of street maskers, the dignity of the great street parades, the stately etiquette of the large public masked balls, the