By the 1830s, the campus literary societies Linonia, Brothers in Unity, and Calliopean had lost stature. Antecedents īefore the founding in 1780 at Yale of the Connecticut Alpha chapter of Phi Beta Kappa, the second chapter established after that society's founding in 1776 (which still practices a secret handshake among members), Yale College students established and joined literary societies. ' certain limited number were firmly convinced that there had been an appalling miscarriage of justice in their individual omission from the category of the elect,' some founders agreed. The Third Society's founding was motivated in part by sentiment among some young men that they deserved insider status. The tradition continued of creating and sustaining a society if enough potential rising seniors thought they had been overlooked: Bones was established in 1832 after a dispute over selections for Phi Beta Kappa awards Scroll and Key Society, the second society at Yale, was established in 1841 after a dispute over elections to Bones. The founding defeated the last attempt by the administration or the student body to abolish secret or senior societies at Yale. The effort was aided by more than 300 Yale College alumni and a few Yale Law School faculty, in part to counter the dominance of the Skull and Bones Society in undergraduate and university affairs. The society changed its name to Wolf's Head five years later. Some past members have gained prominence in athletics, business, the fine and literary arts, higher education, journalism, and politics.įifteen rising seniors from the Yale Class of 1884, with help from members of the Yale Class of 1883 who were considered publicly possible taps for the older societies, abetted the creation of The Third Society. The current delegation spends its year together answerable to an alumni association. Active undergraduate membership is elected annually with sixteen Yale University students, typically rising seniors.

The society is one of the reputed 'Big Three' societies at Yale, along with Skull and Bones and Scroll and Key. Wolf's Head Society is a senior society at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut.

Skull and bones tomb