He convinced Washington and Lee University’s trustees to donate land adjoining Virginia Military Institute campus, and plans for building a structure were begun. The downstairs was designed with a large room for meetings, a museum, and a library, and the upstairs featured rooms for Alpha and Beta to lease for their own purposes. Unfortunately, alumni of other chapters were less than enthusiastic about favoring the two Lexington-based chapters. The plans were revised, eliminating the consideration for Alpha and Beta, but by 1915 the idea was finally tabled due to lack of funding.
In 1927, the Kappa Alpha Alumni Foundation (KAAF), which had been founded four years before to attain a headquarters, made a renewed drive to build a national office in Richmond, Va. Cyrus Wendell Beale (Zeta 1905) purchased a site for the Order overlooking the famous equestrian statue of Robert E. Lee on Monument Avenue, but the effort collapsed in 1933.
The first administrative office was established in 1934 above the medical office of Knight Commander Emmett Lee Irwin in Suite 721 of the Maison Blanche Building on Canal Street in New Orleans. Six years later, when Irwin relinquished the post of Knight Commander, the national office moved to the Palmer Building at Five Points in downtown Atlanta.
Less than 18 months later, the office moved to Louisville, Ky. This central location proved convenient after World War II when the first Officers’ Training School (now NLI) was held at the Hotel Seelback, just two blocks from the office in the Martin Brown Building.
The administrative office moved back to Atlanta in July 1954, into a new office on the second floor of 830 West Peachtree Street. A growing Order required yet another move, but this time just down the road to 1252 Peachtree Street in 1961. After nine years, the office again moved farther out Peachtree to 3379 Peachtree Road in the Lenox Square area.
As the Order’s hundredth anniversary approached, many members hoped their dream of a national headquarters in Lexington could finally be realized. Accordingly, in May 1964 the Order purchased the 140-year-old Barclay House not far from the Washington and Lee University (W&L) campus. The Executive Council launched Project Centennial that October to raise funds for a new building, and architect and longtime FHC director Alvin L. Aubinoe (Beta Kappa ‘23) designed a headquarters with a “graceful Williamsburg facade.” Instead of breaking ground for their headquarters at the centennial, however, KA reawakened a Lexington preservation movement when residents discovered that the fraternity intended to replace the timeworn Barclay House with a structure better suited to fraternal administration. The building was sold, and the movement for a headquarters again came to a halt.
Despite this setback, many Kappa Alphas still continued to believe in, and contribute money for, a national headquarters. In 1967, the Mitchell property, which overlooked W&L, was purchased, and Aubinoe designed a two-story classical building. Just as the Order was prepared to begin the bidding process in 1969, however, Hurricane Camille swept through Rockbridge County, sending construction costs soaring. Interest in a Lexington headquarters waned, and the land was sold in 1973.
In 1986, KA temporarily moved into redecorated rented space off Walker Street, in Lexington, during the New Year’s holiday. On September 10, 1990, the Kappa Alpha Order Educational Foundation purchased, at auction, the historic Rockbridge County Jail building.
After an almost $1 million renovation and expansion of the jail building, KA moved into its home on October 3, 1992. With the needs of the KAOEF and the fraternity growing constantly, the organizations later purchased adjoining properties and began plans for renovating and moving into these much needed buildings.
