Sigma Alpha Epsilon was founded on March 9, 1856, at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Its founders were Noble Leslie DeVotie, Nathan Elams Cockrell, John Barratt Rudulph, John Webb Kerr, Samuel Marion Dennis, Wade Hampton Foster, Abner Edwin Patton, and Thomas Chappell Cook. Their leader was DeVotie, who wrote the ritual, created the grip, and chose the name. Rudulph designed the badge. Of all existing national social fraternities today, Sigma Alpha Epsilon is the only national fraternity founded in the antebellum South.
STATS:
228 total chapters + 14 colonies = 242 total groups
Approximately 14,000 undergraduates
Average chapter size, including pledges and actives, is 52 men.
Sigma Alpha Epsilon has initiated more than 307,000 men since badge sequences were first recorded.
Nearly 25,000 collegiate brothers have graduated from our annual John O. Moseley Leadership School.
There are approximately 190,000 living alumni in the Fraternity.