As the fall semester comes to a close, many students have begun to think about what student groups they want to join during spring semester. However, some groups on campus do not have a history as well known as others.
Through a series of interviews, The Daily Cardinal was able to uncover some details behind one such group, the little known student organization called the Iron Cross Society.
In the spring of 1951, then Editor-in-Chief of The Daily Cardinal Jack Zeldes attempted to nominate his successor, Jean Matheson, to UW-Madison's Iron Cross Society. A nomination to the Iron Cross Society, a UW honor society, is ""the highest honor an undergraduate could achieve at this university"" according to the group's website.
However, the tradition was not to continue as Jean Matheson was barred from receiving the honor. At the time, membership to the Society was only open to men.
Zeldes fought to earn a spot for Matheson in the organization but was out-voted by a margin of eight to one by then-active members and alumni alike. The Society did not begin to admit women until 1987.
The Society has had a complex role as a university organization since its founding in 1903. Deemed a ""secret society"" by some, the Society is neither entirely secret nor public according to 2006-'07 Wisconsin Union President Shayna Hetzel.
""I think it depends on how you frame ‘secret society,'"" Hetzel said. ""Membership is very public. The names are cast on a shield in the union. The secret part is how they select members and what the society does.""
Hetzel added, ""the fundamental principle of Iron Cross is that it is a prestigious group of student leaders to sort of influence the governance of the campus community.""
The organization's proudest achievement is the founding of the Wisconsin Union in 1907, according to Hetzel. However, she said many do not know the Society intended the Union to be for men only.
Hetzel said the idea of a ""men's Union"" was not fulfilled because women raised more funding than men for its construction. Instead, the Union separated male and female students. The Capitol Room served as the women's lounge, and the men received the Rathskeller and the Terrace.
According to Ted Crabb, Wisconsin Union director from 1968-'01 and Society adviser from 1969-'01, just as women received their own section of the Union, they also started the UW-Madison chapter of the National Mortar Board Society.
Crabb, who was a student member in 1953-'54, said ""the biggest issue [with integration] was one of the fact that there was already a women honor's society, and that Iron Cross would be infringing upon Mortar Board's turf.""
However, as Zeldes wrote in a 1952 letter to Society alum and former congressman Wayne Morse, ""the main argument for maintaining the status quo regarding women … emphasized the traditional element.""
""I tried to emphasize the importance of progress along such lines,"" Zeldes wrote, ""[and] pointed out the analogy between the ‘anti-women in Iron Cross' arguments and the anti-suffrage for women arguments of some years ago.""
The ""separate but equal"" stance was maintained until the UW-Madison chapter of the Mortar Board dissolved in the mid-eighties. After that, as 1987 Iron Cross President David Weidig said, the decision to let women in was easy.
""There really wasn't any opposition to it. It hadn't been done before because of tradition, but everybody was fine with it,"" Weidig said. ""It just made sense.""
Crabb said the issue surrounding women members in the 1980s was much different than concerns in the 1950s.
""Once the decision was made … it was just accepted and we moved on,"" he said.
At the Iron Cross Society's 100th Anniversary Celebration in 2003, at the urging of Zeldes, Jean Matheson was finally given an honorary induction to the organization which had barred her over fifty years earlier.
""One thing I did notice was that at least half the inductees were women,"" Matheson said of the event. ""It was a very gratifying evening.""
