Poe by Candlelight
"Nevermore!" quoth the raven. "Nevermore shall I miss a DiPhi meeting."
Every year, around the week of All Hallows' Eve, senators and guests gather together to experience a most magical night. From sundown to midnight, orators can recite poetry to an audience both illuminated and enshadowed by the dozens of candles in the Philanthropic Chamber.
Recent orations have included Bacchae and Annabel Lee. Books from our special libraries are stacked in the middle of the chamber for one's perusal and consideration. It's expected that you show up in your most macabre pomp; black attire, lace detail, and choice accessorization make the night all the more memorable.
And then, when the clock strikes at mid-of-night, something utterly magical happens.
Poe by Candlelight, October 2022
On Hallows-eve we honor our ancestors through a historical tour of the Old Chapel Hill cemetery. As of now, it is led by Bland Simpson who just so happens to also be the faculty sponsor of these esteemed societies! Of particular note are the Di and Phi plots where the societies founding ancestors are buried. In fact, it was the need to bury one of the society's members which led to the creation of the UNC-Chapel Hill ceremony for those students and faculty who passed away while on campus and could not afford to be brought back to a family plot.
Revived in 1989, The White and Blue continue to serve as the official outlet for the literary interests and works of the Dialectic and Philanthropic Society members. It is named after an earlier short-lived Societal newspaper of the same name that was initially published in 1894 and eventually merged with the Tar Heel. The White and Blue was originally created to oppose the Tar Heel's overt focus on the fraternities and athletics at UNC Chapel Hill (making The White and Blue's eventual merger sadly ironic). When it was revived in the 1980s, it was originally planned to be a quarterly release but ended up becoming a once-per-session publication. In general, The White and Blue has been concerned with collecting the best speeches given before the Joint Senate as well as poetry and other works specifically written by guests and Senators for the paper. One of its founding goals was to grant the Societies greater name recognition and thus many of the earliest issues included statements about the Societies and their events. Clerks were also put in charge of detailing the activities of the Society's previous session. The cost of printing the publication initially fell upon the North Caroliniana Society sponsored by H.G. Jones. Eventually, these expenses fell upon the societies themselves. A committee was created to run the newspaper with the committee chair being granted the monicker of "editor". Senator James Burroughs (Di) was the first "editor" in charge of the White and Blue.