Elihu's colonial-era building, on a basement constructed earlier, in the early 1600s.

Elihu, founded in 1903, is the fourth oldest secret society at Yale University, New Haven, CT. While similar to Skull and Bones, Scroll and Key and Wolf's Head societies in charter and function, Elihu favors privacy over overt secrecy. To this end, Elihu is the only society whose building, located at 175 Elm Street, has windows, though they are shaded. Elihu is likely the very first society to have tapped an undergraduate from an ethnic minority, Henry Roe Cloud, a Native American who graduated in 1910, in keeping with a reputation for diversity. Image File history File links Size of this preview: 610 × 599 pixelsFull resolution (615 × 604 pixel, file size: 36 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) Emblem of the Yale University senior society Elihu. ... Image File history File links Metadata Size of this preview: 800 × 482 pixelsFull resolution (2218 × 1337 pixel, file size: 1. ... Image File history File links Metadata Size of this preview: 800 × 482 pixelsFull resolution (2218 × 1337 pixel, file size: 1. ... Colonial house and street A colonial house, also called Georgian, is a style of house that was popular in America from 1690 to 1830. ... Elihu can refer to several things. ... Young people interacting within an ethnically diverse society. ... “Yale” redirects here. ... This article is about the city in Connecticut. ... Emblem of the Skull and Bones society The Order of Skull and Bones, once known as The Brotherhood of Death,[1] is a secret society based at Yale University, in New Haven, Connecticut, and is one of the oldest student secret societies in the United States. ... The Scroll and Key Society is a secret society established by John Addison Porter and others at Yale University, New Haven, CT, in 1842. ... Wolfs Head (W.H.S.), founded in 1883, is the third oldest secret society at Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut. ... This page is a candidate for speedy deletion. ... Diversity The division of classes among a certain population. ...

Mission

According to the public page of its website, "The Elihu Club is a non-secret Senior Society at Yale University," the purposes of which are "to foster among its members, by earnest work and good fellowship a stronger affection for Yale; a broader view of undergraduate life and its aims; a deeper and more helpful friendship for one another; and to give its members, after graduation, an additional tie to bind them to Yale and to each other." [[1]]

Elihu’s purposes are realized through an educational and social program, which seeks to enrich the undergraduate experience of each member and to foster a strong connection between all Elihu members, undergraduate and graduate. During the Spring Tap process, sixteen rising seniors are elected into membership of Elihu. Consideration for membership in Elihu is given to those juniors in the College who are nominated by current undergraduate and graduate members. Selection is said to be based on three pillars: excellence, diversity, and leadership. It is named for Elihu Yale, the University's first major benefactor and namesake. Elihu Yale Elihu Yale, (April 5, 1649 – July 8, 1721), was the first benefactor of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut in the United States. ...

The Elihu program is similar to that of the other societies: personal histories and perspectives are shared among the current delegates, with formal meetings each Thursday and Sunday of the academic year.

Architecture

The club is housed in a structure looking out on the New Haven Green; the three-story colonial-era white clapboard house is, in fact, the oldest of all Yale's secret society buildings, and purportedly one of the oldest original structures in the United States still in regular use. Its brick basement is older still, constructed in the early 1600s as the Tory Tavern, a central locale of the Revolutionary War. The building has also been expanded to the rear several times. During the demonstrations and student strikes associated with the New Haven Black Panther trials and other civil unrest in 1970, numbers of the twelve thousand protesters at times found refuge inside the Elihu building. Colonial house and street A colonial house, also called Georgian, is a style of house that was popular in America from 1690 to 1830. ... The American Revolutionary War (1775–1783), also known as the American War of Independence, was a war fought primarily between Great Britain and revolutionaries within thirteen of her North American colonies. ... On May 20, 1969, Black Panther Party founder and national chairman Bobby Seale spoke at Yale University. ...

The building is large, belying the modest clapboard facade, and contains sixteen single guest rooms (nominally one for each senior member, although they do not stay for extended periods) and also a dorm room sleeping up to fourteen persons. Another tradition on campus is that Elihu contains original papers of the author James Fenimore Cooper, even drafts of his epic novel The Last of the Mohicans, in its collection. (However Cooper could not have been a member as he was expelled from Yale in 1805, a century before Elihu was founded.) Cooper portrait by John Wesley Jarvis, 1822 James Fenimore Cooper (September 15, 1789 – September 14, 1851) was a prolific and popular American writer of the early 19th century. ... Wikisource has original text related to this article: The Last of the Mohicans For other uses, see The Last of the Mohicans (disambiguation). ...

Notable Members

• Joseph Lieberman, U.S. Senator
• Robert B. Semple, Jr., Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist
• Jim Amoss, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist
• Cesar Pelli, architect
• John Pepper, Jr., former Procter & Gamble CEO
• Sheila Jackson Lee, U.S. Congresswoman
• Peter Beinart, editor of The New Republic
• Paul Monette, author and activist
• Alexander Garvin, urban planning authority
• Stuart Symington, U.S. Senator
• Sam Waterston, actor (Law & Order)
• Sir John Templeton, philanthropist
• Henry Roe Cloud, first full-blooded Native American to attend Yale, reformer, educator
• Lloyd Kaufman, experimental filmmaker

Joseph Isadore Lieberman (born February 24, 1942) is a Jewish-American Democratic politician and a current U.S. senator from Connecticut. ... This article should appear in one or more categories. ... Jim Amoss is Editor of the New Orleans Times-Picayune. ... Pellis Petronas Twin Tower César Pelli (born October 12, 1926 in Tucumán, Argentina) is a noted architect known for designing some of the worlds tallest buildings and other major urban landmarks. ... This biography does not cite any references or sources. ... Procter & Gamble Co. ... Sheila Jackson Lee Sheila Jackson Lee (born January 12, 1950 in Queens, New York), an American politician, has been a Democratic member of the United States House of Representatives since 1995. ... Peter Beinart (born 1971) is a journalist and editor-at-large for The New Republic, having served as editor of TNR from November 1999 until March 2006. ... For other uses, see the New Republic disambiguation page. ... Paul Monette (October 16, 1945, Lawrence, Massachusetts – February 10, 1995, Los Angeles, California) was an American author, poet, and activist who wrote about gay relationships and AIDS. Monette graduated from Yale University in 1967, conflicted about his sexual identity, and moved to Los Angeles where he lived with his... Alexander Garvin is a noted American urban planner, educator, and author. ... William Stuart Symington William Stuart Symington (June 26, 1901–December 14, 1988) was a businessman and political figure from Missouri. ... Samuel Atkinson Waterston (born November 15, 1940) is an Oscar nominated American actor noted particularly for his portrayal of Jack McCoy on the long-running NBC television series Law & Order. ... Law & Order is a long-running American television police procedural and legal drama set in New York City. ... John Marks Templeton, renowned stock investor and businessman, was born on 29 November 1912, in the town of Winchester, Tennessee. ... This page is a candidate for speedy deletion. ... Lloyd Kaufman Lloyd Kaufman is an American film director, producer, and documentarian. ...

See also

• List of collegiate secret societies

Collegiate secret societies are typically college class societies that will have some part of their initiation ritual, internal structure, or general culture kept private from those who are not initiated into it. ...

External links

• Secret societies: tombs and tradition
• Eager juniors await secret society taps
• How the Secret Societies Got That Way