Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated Chi Omega Chapter Timeless Service Through the Years 1925-2014

Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. Chi Omega Chapter History 1925-1949 On December 19, 1925, while teaching at Brick Junior College, Bricks, North Carolina, Anna Easter Brown, with the assistance of Jessie B. Thornton, organized Chi Omega Chapter after being deputized by L. Pearl Mitchell, the National President. The charter members of this chapter were Anna Easter Brown, Jessie B. Thornton, Mabel Robinson, a graduate of Boston’s School of Music, Boston, Mass., Thelma Black, Valley K. Redding, and Zobia Coleman, all graduates of Talladega College, Mobile, Alabama. The first officers for the chapter were Anna Easter Brown, President; Jessie Bullock Thornton, Vice President; Valley K. Redding, Secretary and Corresponding Secretary; and Mabel Robinson, Treasurer. One of the first duties of the chapter was to develop the chapter’s constitution with the national constitution serving as a guide. Although the chapter was small and located in a rural area, the chapter always met the national obligations. This small group enjoyed such activities as cookouts, teas and candy making. Selling homemade fudge was one of the chief means of raising funds for the chapter’s activities. Five years later, in the spring of 1930, Jimmie Bryant, a teacher of home economics at Booker T. Washington High School, became the first chapter initiate. She was a graduate of Prairie View College, Houston, Texas and Columbia University, New York, New York. That summer, she married Mr. Charles T. Edwards, who was the principal of Booker T. Washington High School in Rocky Mount, North Carolina. In the same year, Evelyn Fortney, director of Physical Education at Brick Junior College, transferred to Chi Omega Chapter from Sigma Omega Chapter in Cincinnati, Ohio. A dance was held in celebration of the new members. In the spring of 1931, Ernestine Bulluck Davis, a graduate of Shaw University Raleigh, North Carolina, Pocahontas Whitley, a graduate of Union University, Richmond, Virginia, and Sadie Robinson Gaither, of Knoxville College, Tennessee became members of Chi Omega. These new members were teachers at Booker T. Washington High School, Rocky Mount, North Carolina. After the closing of Brick Junior College in 1933, the chapter relocated to Rocky Mount, North Carolina, where the majority of the members lived. Chapter meetings were held at the homes of members.