On the evening of Sept. 12, the men of Alpha Tau Omega held the second annual gATOr Bash. The event was held on the Miller Quad from 4 p.m. to around 7 p.m., ending a little earlier than expected due to scheduling conflicts.

There were many different activities to participate in including listening to live music, playing Minute to Win It games, football, Frisbee and for every $50 raised you could throw a pie in an Alpha Tau Omega member’s face. In addition to games at the event, there were also hot dogs, hamburgers, chili, soda and chips to eat.

The music line up for the event included ‘Dem ‘Dare Burdick Boys – whose members include Dr. David Burdick and his two sons and university students Emma Taylor and Tyler Hollis, who opened the show – performers Hannah Lieb and Nick Gaines and another band, The Cover Ups.

This program is known as ATO’s signature philanthropy event, raising money for Special Olympics.

Trey Pogue, a very active member of the fraternity, commented on the event’s success, and said, “This year we focused on having more music for people to enjoy and being centered on asking for more donations. We brought in more money by having all of the different activities, and it was a blast to see everyone participating and having fun.”

By the end of the night the members of this chapter were able to raise around 700 dollars for the Special Olympics here in Decatur. If you weren’t able to participate in the event but still want to these gentlemen out, you can go to http://www.memberplanet.com/campaign/atomillikin/gatorbash2015 to donate a variety of different amounts.

The men of ATO also celebrated a very important day on Sept. 11 – their brotherhood’s 150 birthday. On Sept. 11, 1865 Otis Allan Glazebrook invited Alfred Marshall and Erskine Maye Ross to his home in Richmond, Va. where he read the Constitution he had written to them and invited them to sign. In that moment, ATO was born.

The south had lost all of its fraternities during the Civil War making ATO the first fraternity founded after the Civil War and the first sign of Greek life in the old Confederacy. Through the years the fraternity expanded across the nation until it had 136 active chapters. Millikin’s chapter, Theta Iota, came to be on March 22, 1975.

Since then the members of Alpha Tau Omega have gone on to win awards like these while at Millikin: 2009 Sophomore Student Leader of the Year, 2009 Junior Student Leader of the Year, 2009 Senior Student Leader of the Year, 2009 Greek Man of the Year, 2009 Greek Week Champions, 2010 Raising Student Leader of the Year, 2010 Senior Student Leader of the Year, 2010 James Millikin Student Leader of the Year, 2010 Millikin University 5 Star Award.

The chapter has 29 active members, each living up to the ATO Creed: To bind men together in a brotherhood based upon eternal and immutable principles, with a bond as strong as right itself and as lasting as humanity; to know no North, no South, no East, no West, but to know man as man, to teach that true men the world over should stand together and contend for supremacy of good over evil; to teach, not politics, but morals; to foster, not partisanship, but the recognition of true merit wherever found; to have no narrower limits within which to work together for the elevation of man than the outlines of the world. These were the thoughts and hopes uppermost in the minds of the founders of the ATO Fraternity.