Phi Delta Gamma of Puerto Rico is the first is a Puerto Rican organization of Greek letters, which is founded in the western town of Mayagüez

Mayagüez, Puerto Rico

Mayagüez is the eighth-largest municipality of Puerto Rico. Originally founded as "Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria" it is also known as "La Sultana del Oeste" , "Ciudad de las Aguas Puras" , or "Ciudad del Mangó"...

. Phi Delta Gamma of Puerto Rico is founded in April 25 of 1942. This fraternity surges from a high school fraternity, Alpha Iota Omega, which was founded in 1939. When the brothers of the Alpha Iota Omega enroll in the College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts

University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez

The University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez or Recinto Universitario de Mayagüez in Spanish , is a land-grant, sea-grant, space-grant state university located in the city of Mayagüez, Puerto Rico...

 (Colegio de Agricultura y Artes Mecánicas) of Mayagüez, some were offered to pledge one of the original Puerto Rican fraternities, and they decided to do it. The others reunite in the house of the brothers Gilberto Oliver Padilla and Otis Oliver Padilla. They decided to found a new fraternity in April 25 of 1942, and decided to use the Greek letters Phi

Phi

Phi may refer to:In language:*Phi, the Greek letter Φ,φ, the symbol for voiceless bilabial fricativeIn mathematics:*The Golden ratio*Euler's totient function*A statistical measure of association reported with the chi-squared test...

, Delta

Delta (letter)

Delta is the fourth letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals it has a value of 4. It was derived from the Phoenician letter Dalet...

 and Gamma

Gamma

Gamma is the third letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals it has a value of 3. It was derived from the Phoenician letter Gimel . Letters that arose from Gamma include the Roman C and G and the Cyrillic letters Ge Г and Ghe Ґ.-Greek:In Ancient Greek, gamma represented a...

. The founding brothers are Gilberto Oliver Padilla and Otis Oliver Padilla, Raúl Romaguera, Ramón Antonio Frontera, Ignacio Beauchamp, José Ramón Ponce de León, Hilton Quintana, Angel Inserni, Rafael Ferrer Monge “El Cubano” (whom also developed the shield, the first rulebook, and the motto of the fraternity), Rubén D’Acosta, Edgardo Olivencia, César Arana and Hernán Rodríguez. Then, these brothers decide to establish the first chapter as Alpha in Mayagüez; they had plans to expand the fraternity towards all of Puerto Rico. In 1944, the first Phi Delta Gamma clubhouse is established in the Méndez Vigo street of Mayagüez.

In the year 1945, brother Otis Oliver commended to students Juan Mari Brás

Juan Mari Brás

Juan Mari Brás was an advocate for Puerto Rican independence from the United States who founded the Puerto Rican Socialist Party...

 and Manuel Portela Lomba to take the Phi Delta Gamma fraternity to San Juan

San Juan, Puerto Rico

San Juan , officially Municipio de la Ciudad Capital San Juan Bautista , is the capital and most populous municipality in Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the United States. As of the 2010 census, it had a population of 395,326 making it the 46th-largest city under the jurisdiction of...

. These began the task of establishing the Beta chapter in the University of Puerto Rico in Río Piedras

University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras Campus

The University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras , also referred to as UPR-RP, is a public research university located on a campus in Río Piedras, San Juan, Puerto Rico...

. Some of the founding brothers of the Beta chapter are Oscar Colón, Juan Mari Brás, Jean García, Ramón Vargas, Manuel Portela Lomba and Angel Amézaga. Thanks to this effort, the first convention of the Phi Delta Gamma is celebrated in the year of 1945, in the Condado Hotel.

Notable members

Juan Mari Brás, lawyer and political candidate for governor for the Puerto Rican Socialist Party.

Agustín "Tito" Lara, singer

Luis "Luisito" Vigoreaux, Jr., television actor and producer.

José Soto, director of Water Agency (AAA)in Puerto Rico.

Jorge Seijo, radio political analyst

Joaquín Porrata, radio sports analyst.

José Angel "Chiro" Cangiano, lawyer, entrepeneur (Lions of Ponce teams), writer, brother of Milly Cangiano.

Manuel Díaz Saldaña, former comptroller of government of Puerto Rico.

Luis Cabrera, actor

Alfredo J. Santana Velázquez, bodybuilder with international awards