Collegiate Times

Tragic events, locally and globally, have evoked strong emotions and student proactivity from the Virginia Tech community. The brothers of the Zeta Psi Fraternity are living the reality of a tragedy as they rebuild their East Roanoke Street home.

Last October, Zeta Psi was struck with the tragedy when its fraternity house burned down early one Monday morning. While overcoming a tragedy within the fraternity, the brothers of Zeta Psi have worked closely together to alleviate their losses and strengthen their brotherhood.

Nobody was injured in the fire, and all five brothers residing in the house at the time were able to find new housing. University Terrace apartments contacted Trevor Johnson, president of Zeta Psi and a junior human nutrition, foods and exercise major, and said that they had an apartment for four brothers. The fifth brother moved on campus before moving off recently, Johnson said.

Immediately after the house was burnt down, Zeta Psi began to rebuild it with the support of the Town of Blacksburg, Greek-affiliated students and the Virginia Tech community.

Johnson said the university offered the brothers who were residing in the house laptop rentals, as well as books that were destroyed in the fire. The university also contacted appropriate faculty to assist in academic support to the brothers.

Lambda Chi Alpha, Delta Sigma Phi, Sigma Alpha Epsilon and Fiji sponsored a benefit concert at Top of Stairs to raise money for the reconstruction of the house. Local churches have offered the brothers assistance after the tragedy. Sororities have also offered furniture to the house upon its reopening.

?After the fire, our main focus was to do everything in our power to have it back and operational as soon as possible. The house is still structurally sound so we did not have to demo the entire house,? Johnson said. ?Instead, it was stripped to the studs on the inside and the front porch was removed (as it was the location of the fire and was damaged the most).?

Johnson said current demolition has been completed, and the fraternity is awaiting construction bids. The fraternity plans on reopening the house at the beginning of the upcoming fall semester.

The house will maintain the old layout, but the renovation will involve new floors and walls.

?We aren't allowed to move any walls or anything like that so the footprint of the house will remain the same. However, since the house is over 100 years old, having the inside completely reconstructed (i.e. new walls, floors, etc) will be an improvement over most anything that is that old,? Johnson said.

The case of what might have initiated the fire remains a pending investigation.

?We still don't know how the fire started. We are still taking any information anyone can offer as to how it begun,? Johnson said.

Keith Bolte, fire chief of the Blacksburg Fire Department, said, ?The fire department determined that the fire started on the couch on the front porch. We have turned the case over to the police department.?

Lt. Bruce Bradbery of the Blacksburg Police Department said that the cause for the fire is still unknown, and the case of the Zeta Psi house fire remains active.

While the house fire temporarily destroyed a landmark site of Zeta Psi, the brothers did not allow a tragedy to negatively affect their brotherhood.

?It is through tragedy that you remember some things that you may not have realized in some time. For our brothers we realized how important we are to each other and that we are a family. From that we rallied on each other and carried on with our semester.?

Johnson said that the tragedy has not been a deterrent in their organizational events.

?We still were able to hold our first philanthropy event (The Miss VT Pageant), we still initiated six new brothers at the end of the semester, and a few weeks ago we were recognized as Brotherhood of the Year at the 2005 Fraternity and Sorority Life Awards.?

?It's been a learning experience, but one that makes you a better person for having gone through it,? Johnson said.