John Cain Spring 2009 Semester

I arrived in Boston on Sunday to a city that just had a foot of snow dumped on it the day before. From what I could tell it was a little warmer than what I had left behind in Indianapolis. I ended up on a later flight out of Cincinnati so Matt Roy and I left the airport and went straight to Boston U's campus, bags in tow. We met with the chapter there to talk about recruitment, they were a great bunch of guys that represented our Alpha chapter well. To you non-Greek readers, the Boston U. chapter is the first chapter of Lambda Chi Alpha and is where our founder, Warren A. Cole, was a student.

Trinity Church

Warren Cole wanted to start a fraternity that was different from the rest and he most certainly accomplished this. He was perhaps the greatest recruiter this fraternity has ever seen and was responsible for most of the early success of Lambda Chi.

Boston U. Chapel, College of Arts & Sciences

Boston U. College of Arts & Sciences

The BU campus was amazing. Large academic buildings lined the Commonwealth Avenue where the green line subway came above ground and ran down the middle of the street. I'm sure we looked the tourist part as we looked around pulling suitcases behind us through the snow and slush. We got to our hotel, named Hotel 140 which was in the old YWCA building downtown. This was definitely one of the most trendy places I've ever stayed in and was right across the street from Trinity Church and the Boston Public Library.

Monday was a light day on the business side. Our main goals were to visit 22 Joy Street (where the name Lambda Chi Alpha was first uttered) and drop off flowers to the woman that lived there. Come November we will be having our closing Centennial Celebration in Boston and this house is one of the tour stops.

22 Joy Street - Birth of Lambda Chi Alpha

Standing across the street from this home really brought me full circle and helped me feel more secure that God has put me in the right place. Just two blocks from this home on Joy Street sits the Massachusetts state capital building and Boston Common. Not more than 8 years ago I was standing in this park with my family on vacation. Little did I know that the location of the birth of my fraternity that has become such a large part of my life was just a few yards away. That to me is amazing.

State Capital Building (back)

Tuesday took us (again with bags in tow) to Cambridge to visit the chapter at MIT. I never in my life expected to be walking the campus of MIT. It was a quite a thrill and though it seemed like your run-of-the-mill college campus, I know not many people from my hometown are afforded an opportunity to see a place like that and I am so grateful to have an experience like that.