the struggle of African -Americans and people of color around the world.
Alpha Phi Alpha, the first intercollegioate Greek-letter fraternity established for African-Americans, wa
founded at Cornell University in Ithaca, new York by seven college men who recognized the need for a
strong bond of Brother hood among African-American descendants in this country. The visionary founders,
known as the "Jewels" of the Fraternity are:
Henry Arthur Callis
George Biddle Kelley
Eugene Kinkle Jones
Charles Henry Chapman
Nathaniel Allison Murray
Vertnor Woodson Tandy
Robert Harold Ogle
prejudice, both educationally and socially, at Cornell. The Jewel founders and early leaders of the
Fraternity succeeded in laying a firm foundation for Alpha Phi Alpha's principles of scholarship,
fellowship, good character, and the uplifting of humanity.
Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. has long stood at the forefront of the African -American community's fight for civil rights through leaders as: W.E.B. DuBois, Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., Edward Brooke, Martin Luther King, Jr., Thurgood Marshall, Andrew Young, William Gray, Paul Robeson and many others.
The Fraternity has grown steadilty in influence throughout the years. It intergrated it racial membership in
1945 and it had expanded ot the extent that there are now over 700 chpters located throughout the U.S.,
Carribbean Islands, AFrica, Asia, Europe, and the West Indies.