A.D. Club

Final club at Harvard University, US

A.D. Club

Founded	1865; 160 years ago (1865) Harvard University
Type	Final club
Affiliation	Independent
Former affiliation	Alpha Delta Phi
Status	Active
Scope	Local
Chapters	1
Headquarters	1 Plympton Street Cambridge, Massachusetts United States
Website	www.oneplymptonpreservation.org

The A.D. Club is a collegiate final club at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusettes. It was established in 1836 as a chapter of Alpha Delta Phi fraternity. It withdrew from the fraternity and 1865, changing its name to the A.D. Club.

History

Alpha Delta Phi

The A.D. Club originated at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1836 as Alpha Delta Phi fraternity. It was founded by editors of the college's monthly literary magazine. It was considered an honorary chapter, with its members having honorary membership to other chapters, because Harvard did not allow secret societies on campus at that time. Its founding members were John Bacon, William Augustus Davis, John Fenwick Eustis, Horatio Emmons Hale, Charles Hayward, Samuel Tenney Hildreth, Charles Stearns Wheeler, and Henry Williams.

In 1846, the faculty allowed the fraternity to have a regular chapter on campus. However, the chapter was abolished in 1857 and had to operate sub rosa. The chapter had no new members in the class of 1859. At that time, the chapter decided to change its name to Haidee, pretending to be a club named after a college boat.

Finally conceding to the university's anti-secret society stance, the chapter surrendered its charter in 1865 and became a non-secret society called the A.D. Club. A.D. Club is a final club, meaning that its members cannot join any other similar club. It is an all-male society. The club's officers include president, vice president, secretary, treasurer, custode, and librarian. After the Porcellain Club, it is considered the most socially prominent of the final clubs at Harvard.

On February 13, 1917, The A.D. Club of Harvard College was incorporated as a trust. On May 2, 2021, it reorganized as a nonprofit corporation, A.D. Club, Inc. In addition, there is the One Plympton Preservation Foundation, a nonprofit organization that oversees the care of the A.D. Club's historic house. These various organizations are headquartered at 1 Plympton Street in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Symbols

The A.D. Club's symbol is a bull on a sword. This symbol is carved in stone over the entrance to the society's clubhouse. It is also on the A.D. Club's china, manufactured by Wedgewood. It is also used on early 19th-century club medals, along with the motto Aut Birat Aut Abeat that translates to "Either Drink or Leave".

Clubhouse

Before 1872, the A.D. Club rented rooms in the upper story of a brick house on Palmer Street in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1873, it moved to a building on Brattle Street. In September 1878, the club leased a house on the corner of Mt. Auburn and Dunster Streets; later, alumni raised funds to purchase the property.

In April 1899, the club purchased the property from the Helen Niles estate, at the corner of Plympton Street and Massachusetts Avenue in Cambridge. There, construction began on a new clubhouse in May 1900. In September 1900, the club moved to its present clubhouse at 1 Plympton Street. The club occupied the top two stories of the brick and stone building and rented the first floor to a music store and a tailor's shop.

A fire started on the first floor of the building on January 18, 1902, causing smoke damage to the club's quarters. In April 1926, there was another fire, requiring $1,000 in repairs. In 2020, the A.D. Club's house was valued at $7,208,500.

Membership

The A.D. Club's members are male students who typically join during their sophomore year. In 2015, the A.D. Club decided to remain all-male, despite pressure from the university to go co-educational.

Members are recruited during Punch, a six-week-long process for all of Harvard's final clubs that takes place annually from October to early December. A.D. Club membership had traditionally been by invitation only. The club held its first open Punch in the fall of 2017, in response to the university's criticism of final clubs' exclusivity. This allows any male student to attend A.D. Club's Punch events and possibly gain membership into the club.

Notable members

Following are some of the notable members of the A.D. Club.

Charles Francis Adams Jr. – president of the Union Pacific Railroad
Charles Francis Adams III – United States Secretary of the Navy
Charles Francis Adams IV – electronics industrialist
Craig Adams – professional ice hockey player
Larz Anderson – diplomat and U.S. Ambassador to Japan
Robert Bacon – United States Secretary of State and U.S. Ambassador to France
James Blake – professional tennis player
Benjamin C. Bradlee – executive editor of The Washington Post
Phillips Brooks – Bishop of Massachusetts and author
Michael Temple Canfield – American diplomatic aide
Russell S. Codman Jr. – real estate executive and commissioner of the Boston Fire Department
Charles William Eliot – president of Harvard University
Manning Ferguson Force – justice of the Superior Court of Cincinnati and recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor
Charles Edward Grinnell – clergyman, lawyer, and writer
Edward Everett Hale – author, historian, and Unitarian minister
Horatio Emmons Hale – ethnologist and philologist
William Randolph Hearst – United States House of Representatives, newspaper publisher, and founder of Hearst Communications
Henry Lee Higginson – businessman and philanthropist, founder of Boston Symphony Orchestra
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. – Chief justice of the United States Supreme Court
Arthur A. Houghton Jr. – president of Steuben Glass Works, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the New York Philharmonic
Amo Houghton Jr. – United States House of Representatives
David McKendree Key – United States Ambassador to Burma and Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs
James Gore King – justice of the New York Supreme Court
Samuel Longfellow – clergyman and hymn writer
James Russell Lowell – U.S. Ambassador to Spain, U.S. Ambassador to the Court of St. James's, poet, and Harvard professor
J. Harleston Parker – architect
Stephen Henry Phillips – Attorney General of Massachusetts and the Kingdom of Hawaii and Minister of Foreign Affairs and on King Kamehameha V's Privy Council
Frederick H. Rindge – business and founder of Malibu, California
Stephen Minot Weld – schoolmaster and member of the Massachusetts Governor's Council
Charles Stearns Wheeler – farmer and Transcendentalist pioneer

Notes

The A.D. Club history says the fraternity charter was surrendered, while Baird's Manual says it was withdrawn. The fraternity chapter was reestablished at Harvard from 1887 to 1907, withdrawing to form Fly Club, another final club. This was not related to the A.D. Club.

References

^ The A.D. Club of Harvard University--1837-1906. Cambridge: A.D. Club. 1906. p. foreward – via Google Books.
^ Shepard, Francis W., ed. (1927). Baird's Manual of American College Fraternities (11th ed.). Menasha, Wisconsin: George Banta Publishing Company. p. 34 – via Google Books.
^ Baird, William Raimond, ed. American College Fraternities, 1st edition. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co.,1879. pp. 27-28. via Hathi Trust.
^ The A.D. Club of Harvard University--1837-1906. Cambridge: A.D. Club. 1906. – via Google Books.
^ Fahs, C. Ramsey (March 31, 2016). "A.D. Club to Host 'Open' Punch Process, Mandate Sexual Assault Training". The Harvard Crimson. Retrieved 2024-04-25.
^ uchincloss, Kenneth (November 22, 1958). "The Final Clubs: Little Bastions of Society In a University World that No Longer Cares". The Harvard Crimson. Retrieved 2024-12-27.
^ Aoyama, Andrew W.D. (April 2, 2020). "A Gentlemen's Agreement". The Harvard Crimson Magazine. Retrieved 2024-12-27.
^ Delwiche, Theodore R.; Delwiche, Noah J. (November 16, 2015). "A.D. Club 'Strongly' Opposes Membership Changes". The Harvard Crimson. Retrieved 2024-12-27.
The A.D. Club of Harvard University--1837-1906. Cambridge: A.D. Club. 1906. pp. 5–20 – via Google Books.
"A.D. CLUB, INC. Summary Screen". The Commonwealth of Massachusetts. 2013-05-26. Retrieved 2024-12-27 – via web.archive.org.
"About". One Plympton Preservation Foundation, Inc. Retrieved 2024-12-27.
"Wedgwood, Harvard Ad Club". Replacements, Ltd. Retrieved 2024-12-27.
"1942 Harvard A.D. Club Medal". Stacks Bowers. 2021. Retrieved 2024-12-27.
"Suburban Matters. Cambridge". Boston Post. 1878-09-27. p. 3. Retrieved 2024-12-27 – via Newspapers.com.
"Harvard University Club Buys Property". Boston Evening Transcript. 1899-04-22. p. 8. Retrieved 2024-12-27 – via Newspapers.com.
"Clubhouse for Harvard's A. D. Club". Boston Evening Transcript. 1900-03-07. pp. 8, part 2. Retrieved 2024-12-27 – via Newspapers.com.
Cambridge Historical Commission, "City of Cambridge, Landmarks and Other Protected Properties" Archived 2010-06-05 at the Wayback Machine, 2009.
"New Buildings". The Boston Globe. 1900-09-27. p. 2. Retrieved 2024-12-27 – via Newspapers.com.
^ "Blaze in Cambridge". The Boston Globe. 1902-01-18. p. 8. Retrieved 2024-12-27 – via Newspapers.com.
"Early Morning Blaze Does $1000 Damage in A.D. Club". The Harvard Crimson. April 26, 1924. Retrieved 2024-12-27.
^ Adler, Jonathan G.; Fahs, C. Ramsey (September 14, 2016). "A.D. Begins First 'Open Punch' with Schmoozing and Soft Drinks". The Harvard Crimson. Retrieved 2024-12-27.
^ The A.D. Club of Harvard University--1837-1958. Cambridge: A.D. Club. 1958. – via Internet Archive.
"Robert Bacon - People - Department History - Office of the Historian". History.state.gov. Archived from the original on 5 December 2018. Retrieved 20 December 2021.
"Blake Talks Harvard Before Aussie Open | Sports". Thecrimson.com. Archived from the original on 2013-08-06. Retrieved 2013-08-26.
"The Men's Final Clubs | Flyby | the Harvard Crimson". Archived from the original on 2011-11-10. Retrieved 2011-11-10.

External links

One Plympton Preservation Society, Inc.

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