San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1926-04-04

RADLEY COLLEGE in Peoria, Hi
X nois, is a co-educational institution
and the young women have their
own secret Greek letter societies which
the BOY students are not allowed TO join
or know anything about. Now and then
the young men tease the girls when they
get a chance and nothing delights them
more than to get hold of some secrets of
the girls societies.
And thus it came about the other night
that three of the college boys got word
that there was to he an Initiation in one
of the girls societies and that fourteen of
the new memberships, or "plcdgrS' as
they are called, were to gather solemnly
at the entrance of a graveyard and then be
conducted in silence to the initiation cere-
monies. The three students took advan-
tage Of this information, and. rohed in
white, hid themselves IN the cemetery and
played GHOSTS instead of being
stampeded, the group of intrepid young
women turned on the white Shected fig
ures, and while two of the boys escaped,
they captured one and tied him to a tomb
stone, where he shivered through the
night until he was set free by the police
in the early morning hours.
The episode of the three ghosts" is
the talk of the town. for among the girls
are some of the prettIest goods of the col
lege, while the youth who figures as the
central victim of this event is none other
y
football star captain of this years all
State champion football team of Bradley,
who, now in his senior year. can look back
on the honor of being picked all-State guard
for three consecutive years. Incidentally,
Gene" as he is affectionately known by
every Bradley student. is the champion
practical joker of the college and an all
around good fellow.
1t was on Lincoln's Birthday at the
witching hour of midnight, that hour ira
ditionally turned over to ghosts and COB
lines for their eerie rides, that this story
had its beginning. II was at the hour of
twelve that a score of pretty girls, all
members of the Lambda Phi Society of
Bradley College, stole quietly from their
sorority house to complete the initiation
of fourteen girls.
For the final rites and before the
pledges could enter into the darkest mys-
teries of the sorority the girls hit upon
the idea of having the neophytes meet
them at the entrance of st. Joseph's Gem
etery, one of the oldest cemeteries in that
part of the State. The cemetery is sit
uated a block to the West of the Peoria
city limits in a particularly wild although
a picturesquely beautiful section. Thanked
by steep, wooded hills, covered with a thick
underbrush. the cemetery has been the
seat of countless rumOrs for years of
ghostly Vaccinations. There are many
inclined to be superstitious who refuse TO
pass il ~SStout being armed with the pro-
verbally lucky rabbits foot. Others who
pass il after night are known to whistle
after the fashion of the luckIesS lchabod
Crane.
But not for the Lambda girls Nor their
pledges. Not in these husky days of COM
petition when Bradley sorority girls are
making the staggering college youth Won
der if Prince of Wales fashions and the
Charleston are so important after all as
the girls gaily assault the broad jump and
shot-put records made by their male COM
petitors.
It-was cold night For Winter nights
in most Middle Western towns at the best
are only good for a trip back through the
moonlight from dance at a country club
or for an evening Of skating in the brac-
ing air. A blanket Of snow covered the
hills and roadway about the cemetery and
the grim headstoncs Of the graveyard dis
closed a hoary cap Of frost to the chill
air. Across the cemetery penetrating
wind swept out Of the rayines surround
ing the girls, while gray clouds scamper"d
over a moonlit sky in the face Of brisk
wind.