September 22, 2024, at 10:30am
Today is Sunday, which is usually noticeably quiet around the small town of Stillwater. I saw girls walking in cute sundresses with tote bags on their arms, getting into their cars. I assumed that they were headed to church. There was a big gap between the Sigma Nu fraternity and Lambda Chi fraternity houses. Which is right along the street across from Theta Pond. In this gap there were construction vehicles and a giant, dirt crater in the ground all fenced off from the public. Pinned on the front side corner of the fence was a poster with a big picture of a house. It looked just like most of the other sorority houses, but more updated. On the bottom of the poster, it read “Zeta Tau Alpha house coming soon Fall of 2026.”
This meant that for the time being the sisters of Zeta did not have house to meet in. So, they would have to do their duties in the Wes Watkins building down the street. I did some research and discovered that many of the houses do these updates every few years because once the house reaches the 100-year mark they are unable to do anything to them. By that time, it is considered a historic landmark, so they must act in a timely manner if they want to keep things up to code.
I got news that the Theta house just turned 80 years old this year, so they plan to go through renovations soon. The Delta Delta Delta sorority house is going to be torn down in the next year or so as well. In all this research I talked to a girl apart of Zeta and she said, “even though we do not have a house, we have realized that it is not the building that makes up our chapter, it is our people.” To me that is what makes these houses so special and shows how important the people are to them.
