The Link - Stevens' Yearbook since 1890
History
The first yearbook published by students at the Institute was printed in 1874. The Eccentric, as it was called, was established with the motto, "One revolution per annum." It was the responsibility of three elected members of the junior class to publish the book each year. These editors strived to make their volume of The Eccentric better than those of the previous classes, believing that the relative success or failure of the publication reflected on the entire class. Similar to modern yearbooks, the early editions of The Eccentric featured all active student clubs, fraternities, and athletics teams. It also included a brief summary of the past year from the perspective of each class, as well as original pieces of creative writing and artwork done by students.
The Eccentric was successfully published by the junior class for the next four years. Unfortunately, in the spring of 1877 no sophomores wanted the responsibility of an editorial position. Recognizing the value of the publication, the Institute's fraternities proposed a new system. Each of the three fraternities on campus (Theta Xi, Delta Tau Delta, and Alpha Sigma Chi) would elect an editor to represent their organization. The remaining students who were not affiliated with one of the fraternities were known as "Neutrals," and they would elect a student to represent them in the fourth position on the editorial board. This system was welcomed by the Stevens community and the 1878 edition proved to be as favorable as previous volumes.
The system for choosing The Eccentric's editorial board worked well until 1883, when three newly established fraternities requested the creation of three additional editorial positions so that they could have representation as well. The votes of the four editors were split on this matter, so no change was adopted. Upset with this outcome, Alpha Tau Omega, Chi Psi, and Sigma Chi developed their own publication to rival The Eccentric. They asked the Neutral and Beta Theta Pi representatives to help them, because they had voted for an expansion of The Eccentric's editorial board. The first edition of this rival publication, The Bolt, was published in the spring of 1883.
Both The Eccentric and The Bolt were published annually for the next few years. Although several attempts were made to unify the publications throughout the 1880's, it was not until 1890 that they joined together, giving rise to The Link.
This early history of student annuals at Stevens Institute of Technology was made possible by Drew Cottrell '07 and the rest of the 2006 Link staff.