Ernst J.C. Fischer ’10 O-34: Sixty-Four Years of Service

In a class of his own for service to Lambda Chi Alpha worldwide stands “Fisch,” a co-founder of Mug and Jug and instrumental early national leader. A memorial plaque in the chapter refectory commemorates Bro. Fischer’s legacy of service to the fraternity. The biography below is excerpted from Lambda Chi Alpha: A Historical Perspective, the 1992 national history by Bro. Charles S. Peyser, Ph.D.

Ernst Julius Carl Fischer was born in April 1887. He entered Cornell University in 1906 with the intention of pursuing naval architecture. Upon receiving his degree, however, he worked for the Star Electric Fuze Works of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, for some eight years. He then held various positions of engineering management in the ice cream industry. He was a Royal Arch Mason, a Knight Templar, and a Shriner. “He had been received into the Cornell chapter as an alumnus, having been one of the rollicking group known as Mug and Jug, which met at pre-prohibition rendezvous in Ithaca in 1907. He remained a leader of the group when, to acquire greater public acceptance, it adopted the name ISWZA which, however, was an acronym formed from the first words of a drinking song inscribed on a favorite stein of the merrymaking Mug and Jug.

“Chance was now to set the stage on which Fischer, who had graduated and gone into business, was to be guided into Lambda Chi Alpha. ISWZA bought a house in the fall of 1913, and announcement of this appeared in the Ithaca papers. Albert Cross, an early enthusiast in the Pennsylvania chapter, saw the report, and on the alert to seize any opportunity to further Lambda Chi Alpha expansion, got in touch with ISWZA. The chapter was installed October 11, 1913.”

Fischer was able to attend the Worcester Assembly in 1914 by simultaneously visiting a company client; the Fuze Works paid for the travel.

Oratorical Splendor

“Arriving at the convention, Fischer soon was exchanging ideas with Samuel Dyer (Maine) and Arthur W. Carpenter and Alvah S. Holway, of M.I.T., all officers of the emerging Fraternity. Again fortune intervened. The main speaker for the banquet had not shown up. Fischer, already well-known for his expansive use of English, was asked to pinch hit for the toastmaster. He accepted, and so impressed were the delegates with his handling of the assignment that Holway, who was vice president, managed to get him elected as national chancellor or Grand High Pi.”

“Fischer came to the Fraternity’s highest office at the historic reorganization Assembly December 30, 1919–January 2, 1920, in the not-yet-completed Michigan Union at Ann Arbor. Lambda Chi Alpha at the time was literally penniless and was little more than a loose federation of 53 chapters, more than half of which were three years old or less.”

Fischer was instrumental in the establishment of a genuine endowment fund, which was to be critical to the Fraternity during the Great Depression. Always frugal, he often combined travel for his employer with visits to chapters or to locals that might become ΛΧΑ chapters.

“One thing for which Ernst Fischer will be remembered was his early insistence on creation and maintenance of sound business methods. He brought order out of what must have been chaos. He was quick to ferret out the most practical fraternal practices and put them into effect. He was an extrovert of the first water; his friendship among top men in the leading fraternities was widely known and was of extreme benefit to ΛΧΑ. He was always alert to the best and newest practices in other fraternities, analyzing them to see if they might benefit Lambda Chi Alpha. In many cases he was ahead of the field in sensing helpful procedures. A case in point is the Pædagogus, our membership training manual.

“Just who was the first to propose such a publication probably never can be fully determined. One story that I have heard, and it very well may be the most accurate, was that the matter was discussed in a preliminary fashion by Fischer and the renowned Jack Mason in a compartment on a Pennsylvania railroad train traveling to Philadelphia after the December 1925 convention in Cleveland. The story goes that a rough outline of such a publication was developed that night. Bruce McIntosh, then administrative secretary, an idealist and a gifted writer, soon became a part of the triumvirate largely responsible for developing what soon proved to be an outstanding manual. The new work was not exactly a thing of printing beauty, for funds even then were somewhat limited. The new publication quickly made major impact, for it was one of the two or three first fraternity pledge manuals. One major fraternity [Sigma Chi] quickly sought and was given permission to lift major sections of the manual, in which instance they were presented in genuine printing elegance.”

 

The Elder Statesman

“After he left the office of Grand High Alpha, Brother Fischer continued to serve the Fraternity in many ways, reducing assignments as he grew older. One assignment, however, was never reduced. This was perhaps his most important activity in the postGrand High Alpha years, and one of untold wealth to the Fraternity.

“At all General Assemblies and other functions where Fischer was in attendance, he could be found with a group of undergraduate members or young alumni wherein he would be telling them the Lambda Chi Alpha Story. He would do this in such a manner that increased interest, and enthusiasm would be generated for the Fraternity; yes, carrying over to chapter activities.”

“E.J.C. made several small speeches during the [1978] General Assembly, in the last of which he alluded to the probability that this would be the last of countless Assemblies he would ever attend. At the end of the speech, he gave us a warm smile and his best wishes that we would sustain and improve the brotherhood that he had worked so long and hard in building. When Fischer finished, every Lambda Chi at the Assembly stood for an ovation of several minutes that brought a tear to the eye of each brother. It was easily the most emotional moment of the gathering.”

Ernst J. C. Fischer died on August 23, 1978, at the age of 91, just a few days after his farewell speech to his brothers.