1903-04 Volume 28 No 1–5 - Phi Delta Theta Scroll Archive

522 THE SCROLL.KOBERT ABRAHAM DAVIS WILBANKS, INDIANA, CHICAGO, '67.Robert A. D. Wilbanks, Indiana Alpha, '67, was the mostactive member of A © while he was in college. The fortunesof the fraternity were at a low ebb on account of thecivil war, and he did more than any one else to reanimate thechapters which had survived the struggle, and to kindle newenthusiasm among the members. At his instance, a stateconvention of Phis was held at Indianapolis, June 30, 1865.It was the first state convention ever held by any fraternityand was a most successful affair. Over 100 Phis are said tohave attended, and public literary exercises were held in Masonichall. In the fall of 1865, he entered the University ofChicago and organized Illinois Beta. This chapter was installedJan. II and 12, 1866. In elaborateness the installationceremonies were never before equaled and perhaps havenever since been surpassed. Public literary exercises tookplace at the First Baptist church, Wabash avenue, on thefirst evening and a banquet at Kinsley's restaurant on thesecond evening. "Old Fraternity Records," which have appearedin THE SCROLL, contain many letters from him, inwhich he was constantly endeavoring to incite members torenewed activity in behalf of $ A 0. In a letter to St. JohnBoyle at Centre College, dated Oct. 18, 1865, he proposedthat the fraternity issue a quarterly magazine. This is believedto be the first proposition to issue a * A ® periodicalthat was ever made, and it was made years before any fraternityactually issued a journal. Bro. Wilbanks was a lawyerby profession. His home was in Mount Vernon, 111.He served one term in the Illinois legislature. During thelast few years he had some interests in Mexico which tookhim on trips to that country. He died at Washington, D.C, June 19, 1903. WALTER B. PALMER.•¥•CHARLES McKEE KRESS, DICKINSON, '03.Pennsylvania Epsilon mourns the death of one of heryoungest brothers. Charles McKee Kress, a graduate inlast year's class at the Dickinson School of Law, passedaway in Philadelphia, April i8, 1904, after a short, put severeillness, two days after his twenty-fourth birthday. Bro.Kress, oldest son of Wilson Conrad Kress, Esq., a prominentattorney of Lock Haven, Pa., was graduated from theLock Haven Normal School in 1898, and attended the ColumbianUniversity, Washington, D. C, until 1902, when heentered Dickinson College in the Law Department, receivinghis LL. B. degree with the '03 class.