BETA MU
Wake Forest University

FOUNDED ON
5.18.1932

LOCATION
Winston-Salem, NC

HISTORY
Wake Forest University was established by the North Carolina Baptist State Convention of 1834, and became Wake Forest College in 1838. Until 1922 fraternities were banned at Wake Forest University. Shortly after removal of the ban, Lambda Tau was organized. In 1931, Lambda Tau petitioned Alpha Kappa Pi for a charter. On May 18, 1932, the chapter was installed as Chi of Alpha Kappa Pi by members of Xi Chapter of Alpha Kappa Pi at North Carolina State. Alpha Kappa Pi was the third national fraternity chartered at Wake Forest. The first Alpha Kappa Pi house was on South Main Street. With the merger of Alpha Sigma Phi and Alpha Kappa Pi, the chapter became the Beta Mu Chapter of Alpha Sigma Phi Fraternity. Twenty members were recruited for the first ceremony using the new (to Beta Mu) Alpha Sigma Phi rituals. The 35 man Fall 1949 new member class of Alpha Sigma Phi was the largest in the history of any Wake Forest fraternity to that time. Brother Michael Shaw, Wake Forest ’66, shared that “Of historical note, Wake Forest College was the first major private university in the South to desegregate, and Alpha Sig was the first social fraternity on campus to integrate in 1967.”

The medical school moved to Winston-Salem in 1941 and the undergraduate college completed its move in 1956. In the mid-1950’s the move from Wake Forest to Winston-Salem challenged the chapter.

In 2008 the charter was in jeopardy due to low membership, irregular operations, and loss of its campus housing facility. The chapter was reorganized and in Spring 2009 members from Clemson, Virginia Tech., Presbyterian, UNC-Charlotte, and Appalachian State joined Matt Humberger, Bowling Green ‘03 and Alex Bauer, Purdue ‘05, to assist in recruiting a 38 man new member class. The reorganized chapter made rapid progress and in 2011 received the Grand Senior President’s Award and Manigault Awards for Service and Philanthropy and Chapter Operations.

Beta Mu Chapter won the Grand Senior President’s Award in 1978, the Alpha Gamma Upsilon Award for 1994, and won the National Province Leadership and Tomahawk Awards in 1980. It also won Tomahawk Awards in 1978 and 1971. Beta Mu won the Summa Cum Laude Awards for 1972-3, 1971-2, 1970-1, the Scholastic Improvement Award for 1969-70 and the Academic Achievement Award for 1974. In 2005 the chapter led all Fraternities at Wake Forest with a Fall GPA of 3.03 and a Spring GPA of 3.12.  Horace R. Kornegay,Wake Forest ‘42, has served on the Alpha Sigma Phi Educational Foundation Board of Trustees and won the Distinguished Service Award in 1998. Horace Kornegay,Wake Forest ‘42, Tyler Cox,Wake Forest ‘75, and Sander Smith, Wake Forest ‘85, have received Delta Beta Xi Awards. The chapter newsletter is “Beta Muse.”

CHAPTER AWARDS
Records show award name and year(s) received.

INDIVIDUAL AWARDS
Records show brother's name, initiation year, and award received.