Pi Beta Phi - University of Southern California

ENTRE NOUS 2 100 Years of California Gamma T his year we celebrate the 100th anniversary of the founding of the California Gamma Chapter of Pi Beta Phi during the summer of 1917. The origins of our chapter really began 22 years earlier, in 1895, when seven young women started planning a local sorority they would call Entre Nous. The group became an organized part of USC campus life in 1898. It had the distinction of being the oldest, by some five years, of the six sororities in the College of Liberal Arts. The aim of the Entre Nous founders was "to seal their friendships with a unity of purpose, to build up an organization which should prove an inspiration and a pleasure to all its members, and to encourage scholarship and the highest standards of student life among the women of the university," our historical documents note. "It has been our purpose from the beginning to choose girls of the highest refinement and representative of the broad type of college woman." 100 California Gamma 1917-2017 Pi Beta Phi Here are just a few milestones from Entre Nous and California Gamma: 1895 1898 1907 1907 1915 1915 1916 1917 1920 Entre Nous planning begins. Entre Nous formed. Entre Nous is instrumental in the founding of a Panhellenic organization on campus with an Entre Nous member as its first president. Entre Nous encourages USC faculty to rank sororities scholastically and is ranked #1. Entre Nous rents a house at 745 West 28th Street and hires their "house mother." Pi Beta Phi Grand Council officially endorses Entre Nous on August 4. Members start raising funds to purchase a chapter house. Growing enthusiasm toward affiliating with Pi Beta Phi culminates in a petition for a charter being presented at the Berkeley Convention in July. Numerous letters of recommendation are written by faculty, prominent Pi Phi alumnae, and USC President George F. Bovard, whose daughters Edna and Gladys were Entre Nous members. Forty-three charter members of Pi Beta Phi are initiated by Grand President May Keller at the home of Netta Young on North Harvard Boulevard in Los Angeles in an all-day session July 27. A formal reception followed at the Fisher home on Wilshire Boulevard. A banquet at the California Club completed the week's festivities. Left: Entre Nous lodge at 745 West 28th Street. The site is now part of Gamma Phi Beta's lawn. Middle: The chapter house at 647 West 28th Street in 1940, before remodeling. Right: 647 West 28th Street in the early 1970s.

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