Driving through downtown this morning, I saw a newly unveiled historical marker in Founders Square at Ninth and Main streets for Hopkinsville native Elder Watson Diggs, a co-founder of the greek fraternity Kappa Alpha Psi.
The marker was installed last fall — and I knew several months ago that the Kentucky Historical Society had approved it — but it had remained covered until just recently.
Diggs helped establish Kappa Alpha Psi in 1911 at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. It was a major step for Black men at the university, where segregation rules prevented them from participating in many of the school’s organizations.
Corey Wadlington, a local educator who is a Kappa Alpha Psi member, previously told me that the Diggs marker will attract fellow fraternity members from across the country. They will want to have their photo taken next to the marker in Diggs’ hometown.
“Over a hundred years later, he’s still revered by tens of thousands of men,” Wadlington said.
There is a companion piece to the Diggs marker in Founders Square, also added last fall. It is a mural by local art teacher Paula Gieseke.
A Diggs biography on the Kentucky Commission on Human Rights’ website includes the following:
He envisioned this would help give black men support and sanctuary. He felt a strong, dignified, permanent body could change perceptions and enable future generations to attend the university.
During this challenging time, African American students were not allowed to participate in social and other functions, they were denied use of school entertainment and recreational facilities, and the Ku Klux Klan, which was very active in Indiana, was headquartered just down the road from campus.
Earlier attempts to form an African American fraternity were unsuccessful, but Diggs was determined. On the night of January 5, 1911, his dream of what was to become Kappa Alpha Psi became a reality.
Originally chartered and incorporated as Kappa Alpha Nu, it officially became the Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity in December 1914. Kappa Alpha Psi is a collegiate Greek-letter fraternity with a predominantly African American membership. Since the fraternity’s founding, however, Kappa Alpha Psi has never limited membership based on color, creed or national origin.
The fraternity has over 150,000 members with 700 undergraduate and alumni chapters in every state of the US, and international chapters in England, Germany, Korea, Japan, the Caribbean, Saint Thomas, Saint Croix, the United States Virgin Islands and South Africa.
The Diggs marker in Hopkinsville shares space with another Black leader who was born in Hopkinsville, Dean of Black Journalists Ted Poston. That marker was installed in 2017.
Jennifer P. Brown is co-founder, publisher and editor of Hoptown Chronicle. You can reach her at editor@hoptownchronicle.org. Brown was a reporter and editor at the Kentucky New Era, where she worked for 30 years. She is a co-chair of the national advisory board to the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, governing board past president for the Kentucky Historical Society, and co-founder of the Kentucky Open Government Coalition. She serves on the Hopkinsville History Foundation's board.
