The
AMAZING
ALPHA MU SIGMA CHAPTER
OF SIGMA GAMMA RHO SORORITY, INC. ESTABLISHED 1943
Shawna Rowdy
BASILEUS
Sigma HERstory
Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority, Inc. was organized on November 12, 1922 in Indianapolis, Indiana by seven young educators: Mary Lou Allison Little, Dorothy Hanley Whiteside, Vivian White Marbury, Nannie Mae Gahn Johnson, Hattie Mae Dulin Redford, Bessie M. Downey Martin and Cubena McClure.
Founder Mary Lou Allison Little would serve as acting Grand Basileus from 1922-1925 and go on to become the first elected Grand Basileus of the Sorority from 1925-1926.
On August 24, 1924, Sigma suffered a great loss when Founder Cubena McClure, a young talented artist who designed the Sorority pin, passed away. The remaining Founders carried on and the group became an incorporated national collegiate sorority on December 30, 1929, when a charter was granted to Alpha chapter at Butler University.
In 1937, the Sorority became a member of the National Pan-Hellenic Council. It would be the only Sorority of NPHC to be founded on a predominantly white campus, rather than at a historically black college or university.
AMS HERstory
The Alpha Mu Sigma Chapter of Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority, Inc. was chartered on February 15, 1943 by ten school teachers living and working in Winston-Salem, NC and has served the Forsyth County, NC community for 81 years. AMS joined the local National Pan-Hellenic Council in 1945 and Soror Anna M. Cooke served as the first Basileus from 1943-1944.
Several of the women who chartered AMS received their teaching degrees from Winston-Salem Teachers College (later to become Winston-Salem State University) and taught at Columbian Heights Grade School, built in 1905 as the first elementary school for black children in Winston-Salem.
Alpha Mu Sigma is the first Sigma alumnae chapter in the state and serves as the graduate advisor to one undergraduate chapter in the local area; Rho Chapter at Winston-Salem State University, chartered 1951.
AMS continues to provide educational and civic opportunities for youth in our community through implementing national programs such as Youth Symposium, Wee Savers, & the Rhoer club.
