OXFORD — The Sigma Chi fraternity is known as part of Miami University's “Miami Triad” — one of the original three fraternities on campus.

        Sigma Chi, which this year celebrated its 145th anniversary, was founded at Miami in 1855, just 14 years after the Miami board of trustees passed a resolution making it unlawful for students to join fraternities. (The other two fraternities in the “Triad” are Alpha Delta Phi in 1833, and Beta Theta Pi, 1839.) A second floor of a drugstore facing High Street in uptown Oxford was the fraternity's first home. The Sycamore Street house that burned Friday was built in 1971.

        At the fraternity's 100th year celebration in 1955, the Sigma Chi Foundation started a scholarship fund at MU. At the time the foundation had assets of $534,908, which grew to $18.9 million last year.

        Today, the fraternity has 225 undergraduate chapters, 10 alumni chapters and 200,000 living members, said Mark Anderson, executive director of Sigma Chi Fraternity. There are 47 members in the Miami University chapter, Mr. Anderson said.

        The university, known in Greek circles as the “Mother of Fraternities,” has 28 fraternity and 21 sorority chapters on campus, said Dino Martinez, director of Greek Affairs. The combined membership is equal to almost one-third of the university's nearly 16,000 students.

Frat house fire leaves one injured
Fraternity founded on campus in 1855