Sigma Pi Phi (ΣΠΦ), also known as The Boulé
Sigma Pi Phi ws founded in 1904, is the oldest fraternity for African Americans among those named with Greek letters. The fraternity does not have collegiate chapters and is designed for professionals at mid-career or older. Sigma Pi Phi was founded in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
The fraternity quickly established chapters in Chicago, Illinois, and then Baltimore, Maryland. The founders included two doctors, a dentist, and a pharmacist When Sigma Pi Phi was founded, black professionals were not offered participation in the professional and cultural associations organized by the white community. Sigma Pi Phi has over 5,000 members and 139 chapters throughout the United States, the United Kingdom, The Bahamas, Colombia, and Brazil.
Founders:
Henry M. Minton, PhG [5]
Eugene T. Hinson, MD [5]
Robert J. Abele, MD [5]
Algernon B. Jackson, MD [5]
Edwin C.J.T. Howard, MD [5]
Richard J. Warrick Jr., DDS
Membership in Sigma Pi Phi is highly exclusive, numbering only about 5,000.[7] The organization is known as “the Boulé,” which means, in Ancient Greek “the Council”.[8] Founded as an organization for professionals, Sigma Pi Phi never established collegiate chapters, and eliminated undergraduate membership during its infant stages.[9] However, Sigma Pi Phi has historically had a congenial relationship with intercollegiate Black Greek-letter organizations, as many members of Sigma Pi Phi are members of both. Sigma Pi Phi founder Henry McKee Minton and Martin Luther King Jr. were both members of Alpha Phi Alpha, while Arthur Ashe was a member of Kappa Alpha Psi. Vernon Jordan and L. Douglas Wilder are members of Omega Psi Phi. James Weldon Johnson was a member of Phi Beta Sigma, as was civil rights leader and member of Congress John Lewis (D-GA). University of Massachusetts-Boston Chancellor, Dr. J. Keith Motley, and Hibernia Southcoast Capital CEO (Retired), Joseph Williams are members of Iota Phi Theta. Members of Sigma Pi Phi have provided leadership and service during the Great Depression, World War I, World War II, the Great Recession, and addressed social issues such as urban housing, and other economic, cultural, and political issues affecting people of African descent.
Notable members
Members of Sigma Pi Phi include W. E. B. Du Bois, civil rights leader and one of the founders of the NAACP; Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., civil rights leader; Robert J. Abele, Sigma Pi Phi founder and brother of Julian Abele, who served as the lead architect of Duke University; former NAACP President Kweisi Mfume; Ralph Bunche, a United Nations Ambassador and first African-American winner of the Nobel Peace Prize; Andrew Young, civil rights leader and a mayor of Atlanta; Maynard Jackson, a mayor of Atlanta; Douglas Wilder, a Governor of Virginia; Kenneth Chenault, a CEO of American Express; Bobby Scott; C. O. Simpkins Sr.; Ken Blackwell; Eric Holder, a United States Attorney General; Ron Brown; Vernon Jordan; Arthur Ashe; Mel Watt; John Baxter Taylor Jr., the first African-American to win an Olympic Gold Medal; and Calvin Ball, first African-American County Executive. Numerous other American leaders are among the men who have adopted the fraternity’s purpose of “creating a forum wherein they could pursue social and intellectual activities in the company of peers.” Sigma Pi Phi is open to members of all races, as can be demonstrated by its well-known Jewish member Jack Greenberg, who succeeded Thurgood Marshall as the leader of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc.
In media
Lawrence Otis Graham reports on the organization and his membership in it in the 1999 book Our Kind of People: Inside America’s Black Upper Class.