The Web 1971 "Kappa Alpha"

The Web 1971 "Kappa Alpha"

The photograph on page 287 of The Web 1971 shows the brothers of the Kappa Alpha fraternity holding a large Confederate flag in front of the Robert E. Lee statue on Monument Avenue. A description on the previous page describes "Robert E. Lee on the mantle," "Old South," and "KA stomp to Dixie." The song "Dixie" was played at University events and was viewed as offensive and a symbol of the Old South by black students, with many objecting its use at University events. A description of Kappa Alpha in The Web 1961 explains that Kappa Alpha was created at Washington and Lee University in 1865, and is the "only national fraternity which bases its principles upon the life of an actual person—Robert E. Lee." It goes on to assert that the fraternity "is Southern in the significant sense that its essential teaching is that its members shall cherish the ideal of the Gentleman, of which Robert E. Lee is the perfect expression."

Virginia Baptist Historical Society, The Web (1971): 286. Available online via the UR Scholarship Repository.

The Web, University of Richmond

1971

English

Web.286-1971.pdf

Richmond (Va.)