The Fly Club Harvard Black w/ Gold Stripe Ribbon Braces
$250
*BB pink OCBD shirt sold separately*
The Fly Club is a final club, traditionally "punching" (inviting to stand for election) male undergraduates of Harvard College during their sophomore or junior year. Undergraduate and graduate members participate in club activities.
History
Founded in 1836 as a literary society by the editors of Harvardiana, the club was granted a charter by the Alpha Delta Phi fraternity on March 29, 1837. It remained active until surrendering its charter in 1865. With the graduation of the members of the class of 1868, the club was discontinued until 1878, when graduate members, including Edward Everett Hale (class of 1839) and Phillips Brooks (class of 1855), initiated undergraduates from the class of 1879, to whom the old Harvard chapter charter of ΑΔΦ was restored.
In 1906, the fraternity's charter was once again surrendered, and in 1910, the organization officially adopted the name "Fly Club," its unofficial title since 1885.
Symbols
Some sources maintain that the club's name was derived by combining the "PH" from "Alpha," the "l" from "Delta," and the "i" from "Phi," to get "Phli," pronounced "Fly".
The club motto, suggested by Prof. Morris H. Morgan (class of 1881) and adopted Feb. 1902, reads DURATURIS HAUD DURIS VINCULIS, an ablative absolute construction translated as "Bonds should be lasting, not chafing or hard."
Clubhouse
Constructed in 1896, with a brick facade added in 1902, the Fly clubhouse is located at Two Holyoke Place, near Harvard Square, along the "Gold Coast" of formerly private residences that now comprise Harvard's Adams House, completed 1932. The Fly sits in front of Harvard's Lowell House (1930), across Mt. Auburn Street from the Harvard Lampoon building (1909).
Fly Club Gate
The Fly Club Gate is located along the exterior of Winthrop House. An English Baroque structure, the gate was built in 1914 by a grant from members of the Fly Club. The Fly's symbol, a "leopard rampant gardant" (known as the "Kitty"), is centered within the ironwork above the entry. Inscribed below is a dedication: "For Friendships Made in College the Fly Club in Gratitude has Built this Gate.
Following is a list of Fly Club members. Fly Club is a final club for male students at Harvard University. Member Initiated into the D.U. Club, which merged with the Fly Club in 1996, is indicated with a *.
Academia
William Gardner Choate – founder of boarding school Choate Rosemary Hall
James Bryant Conant* – 26th President of Harvard University
Archibald Cary Coolidge – historian, Harvard professor, first director of the Harvard University Library
Charles William Eliot – 24th President of Harvard University
Samuel Eliot – historian; president of Trinity College, overseer of Harvard University, Boston Public Schools superintendent
Abbott Lawrence Lowell – historian, 25th President of Harvard University
Charles Stearns Wheeler – transcendentalist, noted as inspiration for Henry David Thoreau’s Walden
Architecture
Herbert Dudley Hale – Boston and New York City architect who designed the Fly Club's house at Two Holyoke Place.
William Robert Ware – architect, first professor of architecture at MIT, founder of the School of Architecture at Columbia University
Business
Charles Francis Adams Jr. – president of the Union Pacific Railroad, president of the American Historical Association, and colonel in the Union Army
Charlie Cheever – co-founder of Quora
Albert Hamilton Gordon* – Wall Street entrepreneur, Chairman of Kidder Peabody
George H. Mifflin – president of Houghton Mifflin publishing company
Louis Kane – owner of Au Bon Pain bakery and café
Spencer Rascoff – co-founder and former CEO of Zillow
David Rockefeller* – American banker
Entertainment
Robert Carlock – screenwriter and producer
Fred Gwynne – stage, film, and television actor
Whit Stillman – writer-director and actor known for Metropolitan, which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay
Dustin Thomason — writer-producer known for “The Rule of Four”, “Castle Rock”, “Presumed Innocent”
Law
James Barr Ames – dean of Harvard Law School (1895–1910), known for popularizing the case-study method of teaching law
James C. Carter – co-founder of law firm Carter Ledyard & Milburn
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. – Supreme Court Justice
John Codman Ropes – co-founder of law firm Ropes & Grey
Literature and journalism
Robert Charles Benchley* – humorist
James Russell Lowell – poet, critic, editor, and US ambassador to the Kingdom of Spain and the Court of St. James's
Ernest Thayer – poet, author of "Casey at the Bat"
Evan Thomas – journalist and author
Owen Wister – writer, "father" of western fiction
Military
Henry L. Eustis – General in the Union Army during Civil War; dean of Lawrence Scientific School (now the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences)
Lionel de Jersey Harvard* – first [collateral] descendant of John Harvard to attend Harvard College, a casualty of World War I. Harvard College's Harvard-Cambridge Fellowship (to Emmanuel College) is named in his honor.
Politics
Charles Francis Adams III – Secretary of the Navy, 1929–1932; skipper of America's Cup defender Resolute, 1920; inductee, America's Cup Hall of Fame
Edward Bell – U.S. diplomatic official involved in the decoding of the Zimmerman Telegram in World War I
Joseph Hodges Choate – lawyer and diplomat; U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, 1899–1905
Dwight F. Davis – U.S. Secretary of War, 1925–1929; Governor General of the Philippines, 1929–1932; tennis champion
Grenville T. Emmet – U.S. Ambassador to Netherlands 1934–1937 and Austria 1937–1937
Charles Fairchild – United States Secretary of the Treasury 1887–1889; Attorney General of New York 1876-1877
Joseph Clark Grew – career diplomat, U.S. Ambassador to Japan 1932–1941, oversaw the development of U.S. Foreign Service
Wickham Hoffman – U.S. Minister to Denmark 1883–1885; Colonel in the Union Army
Jared Kushner – son-in-law of Donald Trump; Senior White House Adviser and head of the White House Office of American Innovation
Tony Lake – President Bill Clinton's National Security Advisor
James Russell Lowell – U.S. Ambassador to the Kingdom of Spain and the Court of St. James's, poet, critic, and editor
Deval Patrick – 71st Governor of Massachusetts; quit the club in 1983
Roger Putnam – Mayor of Springfield, Massachusetts and director of the U.S. Economic Stabilization Administration
Jay Rockefeller – U.S. Senator from West Virginia
Franklin Delano Roosevelt – 32nd President of the United States
James Roosevelt – U.S. Congressman (CA), 1955–1965
Theodore Roosevelt – 26th President of the United States
William Weld – 68th Governor of Massachusetts
Religion
Phillips Brooks – clergyman, author, lyricist
Edward Everett Hale – author, historian, Unitarian minister, Chaplain to the U.S. Senate
William Appleton Lawrence – clergyman, 3rd bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Western Massachusetts
Science
Francis Cabot – gardener, horticulturist, chairman of the New York Botanical Garden, and founder of the Garden Conservancy
Michael Clark Rockefeller – amateur anthropologist, disappeared in 1961 during an expedition in Netherlands New Guinea.
Sports
Charles Francis Adams III – skipper of America's Cup defender Resolute, 1920; inductee, America's Cup Hall of Fame; Secretary of the Navy, 1929–1932
Charles Dudley Daly – college football player and coach who was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame
Dwight F. Davis – Olympic tennis player; three-time U.S. Open doubles champion; founder of the Davis Cup; International Tennis Hall of Fame inductee
W. Palmer Dixon – two-time winner of national squash championship (1925, 1926)
Matt Freese – professional soccer player with New York City FC
Henry Thrun – professional ice hockey player for the San Jose Sharks, winner of a gold medal at 2021 World Junior Championship.