Minneapolis ​

Wilbur Fiske Decker did substantial, compelling work throughout his life for the well-being of the city of Minneapolis, its future, and its citizens. He was professional jack-of-all-trades, a utility infielder, in doing the right thing to benefit every facet of the Minneapolis community: educationally, economically, culturally. It was an honest, true, and life-long love in creating a good, enriched civic community, and this desire was a direct reflection of his multi-facets personality and his natural curiosity. To be sure, there were many unmistakable facets to his unique personality, and in an enjoyable and uncompromising way he showed them all. In short, he did not fall short in living up to the inward harmony of his ideals, personal, fraternal, and professional. With resolute wisdom and courage, he wove all of his ideals together and gave them full expression to live an important, free-spirited and enjoyable life. Seemingly, he was content with who he was and the many things he cared about. He was an eminent leader in Minneapolis who always exhibited great civic concern for the well-being of city of Minneapolis, and with equal thought and eminent care he did the same for the University of Maine and our Phi Gamma Delta brotherhood. His life, and the many good, down-to-earth decisions that he made in his life, clearly showed the qualities of good leadership, and living life with determination, curiosity, confidence, and joy. These are the constituent and principal things, I believe, that fraternal life, at their very best, does instill, and we have countless real-life testimonies, equally compelling and true, to the absolute good of our Omega Mu fraternal life throughout our 147 years of fraternal history at the University of Maine. As ever, in unison, persistence and determination remain the real barometer of our fraternal success as undergraduate and graduate brothers. That’s real; that is the compelling Omega Mu way throughout our history, and it will not end now with the great group of undergraduate brothers that now live in the Castle! They continue to be, pure and simple, a great witness to perseverance and determination during this historic period of critical, off-balancing difficulty. Their fraternal spirit did not atrophy during the first semester, it only strengthened in every meaningful way. With calm historic assurance, pride, and dignity, we always move forward because that is our heritage, and that generationally resonating fact started in 1874-1876 when our Q.T.V. brothers paid for and built the first fraternal house, our fraternal home, at Maine State College. Fraternally speaking, no more, no no less, we continue that determined heritage: “Here, now, always.” (T. S. Eliot was correct) That is to say, we are all proud Omega Mu Fijis. Perge. ​

Our brothers’ careers have been productive, constructive, spirited, and prosaic. They displayed impressive skills, talents, and abilities They were, and we continue to be, a beautiful and lively expression of our enduring fraternal beliefs, and that underlying harmony is far-reaching in expectation for all brothers’, undergraduate and graduate. It is the core of what our fraternal founders asserted in 1848 and 1874 and 1899: to live active, commendable, and responsible lives, and to build up community. Clearly and compellingly, they added, and continue to add, positive value at the local, state, national, global, and fraternal level because they engaged life fully and responsibly. In short, they were authoritative pillars throughout life. They were-are exemplary in their citizenship, character, and their sense of dutiful responsibility, and in many instances they were leading voices in their career fields. They prove that success of any kind does not occur by luck or accident, and we remember them because they continue to provide that message for our time. We have long been, from one generation to the next, proud to be Omega Mu Fijis. We continue to cherish our fraternal friendships, our shared memories, and our evolving, forward-focused history at the University of Maine. These things, above and beyond everything else, are the underlying rooted connections that make us proud to be Omega Mu Fijis. Why, after all, should we believe otherwise? We have been doing it well for since 1874 years, and we will continue to do so.
Perge!

Edwin F. Ladd, our Q.T.V.-Phi Gamma Delta brother, was born a little over a year before the start of the Civil War in Starks, Maine, and he died about two years before Black Tuesday. Interesting bookends in a lived life. Within those years, he would have heard, undoubtedly,  about Civil War battles around the dinner table, and he may have even followed the chronology of Lincoln’s political actions, policies, and speeches. You never know. He certainly may have seen soldiers return home at the wars conclusion, and he may have even known one or two. His family had been in the New England ares since 1634, and many of them were innovative, independent-minded, adventurous folks who were fearless. With the same characteristic fearlessness, Edwin F. Ladd would lead the same type of life as his ancestors and make a significant contribution in American History during the Progressive Movement during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
 
Being progressive in both speech and action was natural for Edwin F. Ladd, almost genetic, truly. An intrepid spirit led Daniel Ladd to sail on Mary and John in 1633 for New England, settling in Salisbury. 

​Two centuries later, William Ladd, a graduate of Exeter and Harvard, would exhibit the same intrepid spirit of Daniel Ladd who had sailed to the new world on the Mary and John. Like Daniel, William was not fragile at all; however, unlike Daniel’s driving, liberating spirit to come to the colonies, and to struggle in the new world, William Ladd’s spirit was more progressive, even radical and evolutionary, grounded in the Christian message of peace, in the hope to improve American society by addressing one primary issue: war.

​With apostolic conviction, he believed that humanity needed to liberate itself from the long-suffering chain of human wars. He believed that Christian theology is not indifferent to war, it opposed it without exception. Consequently, he believed it must be abolished in conceptual thought and destructive reality because war was a ‘soul-destroying sin’ contrary to message of Christ, and he repudiated war in all circumstances, offensive and defensive, foreign and domestic. He was a true believer in the Gospel message of liberation and peace at all costs, and he had no problem whatsoever in going opposite to the majority opinion on any issue, and this included his belief that slavery must be abolished in the United States. William Ladd was a man of impeccable honor and integrity, and for that he was a challenging figure in history, just as Edwin F. Ladd would be during the Progressive movement. They both had a way of the seeing America, as well as the entire world, with different eyes, even better eyes, to make it better.
 
The initial stimulus for William Ladd’s theological and historical belief about war was the growing prospect of war with Britain in 1812, and even though he had been financially hurt by the England blockade of New England ports, he opposed the growing shibboleths to go to war with England. Soon after the war started, he moved to Minot, Maine. In the end, we are all guardians of his ideas because everyone believes in peace. 

With tireless energy, William Ladd lectured and preached that peace should not be the aberrant outlier in human history but the enduring lived reality between all people, and the only way to achieve that goal was through the tangible, secular application of Christian Theology in embracing pacifism to avoid any type of war. William Ladd became known as ‘Peace’ Ladd because he believed that the unending sinful chain of human wars could only be stopped by everyone uniting in the cause of peace around the world, and to pursue that reality of that Christian truth by every peaceful means possible. To spread his message, William created and edited two papers: The Harbinger of Peace and The Friend of Peace. This was of as absolute importance, and he called it “the diffusion of light respecting the evils of war and the best means of effecting its abolition”. He would have felt very comfortable in the 1960’s at Cal Berkeley, University of Wisconsin, and Columbia, and he certainly would have applauded Allen Ginsberg’s “America”, most particularly the last line, “America you don’t really want to go to war.” William was a true believer in the need to abolish war and any references to wars by statues, monuments, and plaques, no matter how aesthetically tasteful and humble. He did not see them as historical checks or critical points of reflection, and he did not believe that their absence would be injurious to our national consciousness. Plain and simple, he believed military monument was a direct affirmation and glorification of war and should never be erected. 
 
To further champion his morally progressive vision for a more peaceful America, a more peaceful world, William Ladd founded the first pacifist organization in American History,
initially called the Minot Peace Society, but later renamed the American Peace Society. The first meeting was in a blacksmith shop in Minot, and William Ladd was the first president. 

​His noble vision of peace on earth between all people widened in 1840 when he advocated the creation of a Congress of Nations and a High Court of Nations to resolve disputes to prevent wars. President Woodrow Wilson would use Ladd’s ideas to shape the functional ideals of League of Nations, and his stated principles are clearly evident in the United Nations Charter. Moreover, his ideas are evident in the International Court of Justice. Peace, for William Ladd, was the essential condition for all of human society to survive, and local and international organizations were essential for it’s continuing proclamation.
 
William Ladd remained committed to the Christian Gospel of peace to the very end of his life when he died, in 1841, while giving a speech in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on the soul-transforming nature of peace, consistent to the very end. Idealist like William Ladd, more often than not, are dismissed for that very reason. Ladd was an idealists, and he had the common good of humanity in mind with every sermon, lecture, essay, and article that he wrote, always advocating simple human solidarity around a simple word: peace. Naive, maybe, but he believed it and lived it. Nothing more, nothing less, William Ladd was a champion for peace, and he left a profound influence on American History and World History with numerous organizations in existence dedicated to cause of peace, each the lineal offspring of his American Peace Society that still exists in Washington, D.C. Each of these organizations have their reason of being based on the ideas that were formally shaped and forged in the mind of ‘Peace’ Ladd, fittingly in a blacksmith shop in Minot Center, Maine, and he believed to the very last day of his mortal life that peace work is never done in thought, expressed word, and action. He was a remarkable man at peace in working for long-lasting peace in human society. It was his vision, his calling, to wage peace in changing the moral consciousness of people, and in the fullest sense he performed it in being a Christ-bearer for peace, and that is a life-changing progressive legacy in any age and time. William Ladd was a peaceful, challenging inspiration for radical human reform.

​With open mind and heart, both Daniel Ladd and William Ladd were drawn to a narrative thread to do something different, compellingly different, to take on a massive undertaking and remain committed. Their respective, daring faiths made their ancestral thread resiliently strong and purposeful. That single narrative thread of commitment would continue with Edwin F. Ladd, and his accomplishments would improve the quality life for millions of American during the 20th Century because he had a vision based on science to be a reformer, and he would not be denied.
 
Eighteen years after the sudden death of William Ladd in 1841, Edwin F. Ladd, our Q.T.V. - Phi Gamma Delta brother was born in Starks, Maine. After attending Somerset Academy in Athens, Maine, he attended Maine State College, class of 1884, after studying agriculture and science. He was in the Coburn Cadets, and one of his Q. T. V. brothers was Mark L. Hersey.

​After a short teaching stint in upstate New York, Edwin Ladd went west to the plains of North Dakota to become the first chemistry professor at the newly established North Dakota Agricultural College, now North Dakota State College. He would serve the school from 1890-1921, and he held many responsible roles in his tireless service to the students and faculty of the college: chief chemist, dean of the school of chemistry and the president of the school. 

​In personality and mood as a professor and leader, he was always hard-driving, practical, and exact. He always followed the truths he discovered in chemistry, and he applied those truths for the greater good of everyone. His significance as a chemist, college president, North Dakota food commissioner, and senator was remarkable. He always merged robust scientific thinking and experimentation with broad creative thinking, dedicated to truth and facts, in his service to his students, the citizens of North Dakota, and all American citizens. In 1910, the new chemistry building at the college was named Ladd Hall. 

​His extensive scientific research would lead to truths that would breathe health and life into things that concern everyone today: ‘truthful label’ on paint and flour, the pure-food and drug laws, fair railway rates for farmers, and a standard grading method for wheat. These were sweeping reforms, and in achieving them Edwin Ladd positively shaped and improved American society through his efforts. In so doing he became, along with Senator Robert M. LaFollette and President Theodore Roosevelt, a leader in the Progressive Movement. It was even said that He was ‘the most militant’ progressive. 

​After the passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act, Edwin served on the Standards Committee for Food Products. In addition, he served on many civic organizations and boards in the United Sates and in Europe: the American Association for the Advancement of Science; the Society of Chemical Industry of London; the Society for the Promotion of Agricultural Science; the Association of State and National Food and Dairy, the Association of Official Agricultural Chemists, and ex officio Flood Control officer. During World War I, Ladd served on the Food Administration Board to assure that food and supplies would be given to American troops fighting in Europe and elsewhere, and this led to calls to the American public to conserve and have ‘meatless’ Mondays and ‘wheatless’ Wednesdays, so forth.

​At the conclusion of World War I, Edwin Ladd made speech reasserting everything that he had always said about the American Farmer that he had advocated for in every role he had held: “Will all America awake to the importance of the farmer. Only now do they realize how very important a part of this nation and the world is agriculture. See how dependent out government is today upon out production of wheat in the Northwest. With the war over, the farmer can expect much liberal consideration than he has enjoyed in the past.”

​His resolute convictions, grounded in accrued scientific wisdom, often aroused intense opposition. It never ruffled him in the least. When Republican senators wanted to quietly end the Teapot Dome scandal in order to not hurt the Republican Party, Ladd, a Republican himself, stood firm and aggressively opposed his fellow Republican senators because the first and most important factor guiding him was finding the truth in any matter and not covering up something with political falsehoods for the sake of the party. Facts had always guided him as a chemist, and the truthfulness of the facts of Teapot Dome guided him his unwillingness to turn a blind eye and disregard them. 

​He would not be appeased by their appeals to simply go along for the sake of party image. That was his outlook, and after he openly supported Robert M. LaFollette and not Calvin Coolidge in the Republican primaries in 1924, he was persona non grata in the Republican Party, and he was kicked out of the Republican caucus. 

​Without a single pause or hesitation, Edwin F. Ladd was independent and courageous, just like Daniel and William Ladd before him. Determined idealism or determined realism, it does not matter, Daniel, William and Edwin Ladd each provide a lesson on perseverance and determination. They were like-minded in following their vision and ideals, and though their life-stories were different, the guiding motivation for each of them was the same: truth. They each had a great life-journey because they were each true to their unique pioneering spirits, and that is authenticity at its best, with each of them adhering to a guiding truth that they could not be swayed from, and that is the indivisible Ladd legacy, a progressive truth since 1633.
 
Truth was the unmatched devotional light that guided Daniel Ladd to sail to the new world on The Mary and John in 1633, empty-handed yet hopeful. Truth guided William Ladd, with his Christ-like winning manner, to preach, lecture, and write about peace and pacifism to his last day. Like his family ancestors, in speech, policy, and personal conduct, Edwin F. Ladd always stood for truth, a truth grounded in the verifiable results of science, and that truth made him a powerful advocate for the passage of effective, down-to-earth acts for the greater public good in improving the safety and quality of life for all American citizens during the Progressive Movement. In sum, Edwin Ladd tangibly achieved extraordinary results. He was a man of significance, and he made a real difference, and in doing so he left a lasting legacy that we can all be proud of as Omega Mu Fijis, and that is why we continue to say that perseverance and determination are omnipotent. It’s true. Boris Pasternak said it best: “It is not revolutions and upheavals that clear to new and better days but…someone’s soul, inspired and ablaze. 

Fraternally,
Chip Chapman, ’82
Perge!

Omega Mu Portrait
Walter Flint,
​1882
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