Over 150 years ago, two men, William Henry Letterman and Charles Page Thomas Moore, students at Jefferson College in Canonsburg, PA, were nursing and watching over some stricken friends during an epidemic of influenza at the college. Through their long night vigils, they began to appreciate the great joy they received from selflessly serving others. On February 19, 1852 , Letterman and Moore invited their friends to a meeting. They wanted to discuss creating a brotherhood based on the great joy of serving others. Travel however was impossible that harsh night so the two men founded Phi Kappa Psi alone.

At the time of Phi Psi's founding, Jefferson College was considered part of "The Big Three" in what was known as the "Jeffersonian Cradle." The other two institutions comprising this group, Harvard and Princeton/ Jefferson College merged with nearby Washington College in 1865. Our Pennsylvania Alpha and Pennsylvania Delta Chapters merge coincident with their host institutions that same year.

Recognizing the need and value of eduacation, Phi Kappa Psi urges upon her members the securing of the best and broadest education possible. But unless actuated by a proper love for and service to mankind, the educated man is too apt to shrink from his talents. It is to counteract this tendency that Phi Kappa Psi was founded.

At the outbreak of the War between the States, Phi Kappa Psi claimed a membership of approximately 600, 452 of whom enlisted, and by the end of the war, with a membership meantime of nearly 800, 552 had been in service, 254 in the Union and 298 in the Confederate Army. Of this total, 292 became commissioned officers, including three Major Generals, seven Brigadier Generals, ten Colonels and sixteen Lieutenant Colonels. More than 100 of these brave lads joined the eternal bivouac of the dead in this terrible conflict. The late C.F. "Dab" Williams donated to the Fraternity an unidentified, antique, hand-made Phi Kappa Psi badge found on the Hagerstown pike near Gettysburg , Pa., the day after the decisive Civil War battle ended at that place.