The night before Last Day of Class, some students were cramming in Perkins for last-minute papers and exams. Others got early starts on the next day’s festivities. The campus was hours away from exploding into the alcohol-fueled frenzy of LDOC.
But in the midst of what would soon be a festival ground, more than a dozen men in suits and ties stood silently on the Chapel steps. Some donning hats or sunglasses, the group was divided into orderly rows.
Occasionally, other men in dark-colored robes would suddenly appear from the side of the Chapel near the Divinity School and march in patterns around the quad in front of it. As a robed pair walked back towards the Divinity School, a girl was following in their tracks.
Senior Colleen Sharp stumbled upon the group’s activity last year and decided to take a few photos. This year, she decided to dig into them a bit more.
“Last year, I was living on West Campus, and I saw them over by the Chapel,” she said. “So then I went up and took some pictures of them and they started moving their faces away and trying to block my camera."
She said she was emboldened this year by the increased interest in the group, and a couple of other students joined her in approaching them and following them around the quadrangle.
“I think more people knew they were a secret society this year than last year," she said. "Because last year people would come up and say, ‘What are these people doing?’ This year obviously people were like, ‘What are you doing?’ but it was more like, ‘Oh, is that the secret society?’”
It was the night before LDOC last year as well when she and a few others approached the standing men to ask what they were doing and who they were. But she was surprised by how they chose to respond.
“They actually started typing on their phones and showing it to me as a way to not talk but tell me what they were trying to say,” Sharp said. "One thing that they [typed] was, ‘I wouldn’t ask questions if I were you.’ Then they showed that to me.”
This year, Sharp expected them to be at the Chapel and decided to approach them.
“I’m curious about their ritual,” she said. “I want to figure out what all they’re doing, and what kind of symbolic and material power that is.”
But this time she did more than just take photos and try to communicate with them. When the figures in robes appeared from the Divinity School side of the Chapel, she and a couple of others followed them in their patterned walks and back towards the Divinity School.
When the group started branching off in pairs, she followed one pair into the wooded area toward Science Drive.
When the pair made it back to the Divinity School, some members of the robed group appeared to be staring into the lights outside the building. Sharp followed them back to the front of the Chapel. When a pair broke off and made a loop down to the hospital and academic quad, then toward Wilson Gym, she followed them there too.
At some point during the loop, both the robed and suited figures headed to the James Buchanan Duke statue with candles.
The group surrounded the statue with the lit candles, with some of the men in suits approaching it with their candles as if to read from the plaque on it. Audio of the group's gathering at the statue is included below.
When a pair broke off and headed towards the Allen Building, she followed them. As soon as they were behind the Allen Building enough to be out of sight of the main quad, the pair took off.
“They ran like at a sprint behind the Allen Building,” she said. “I lost them so I circled back, and at that point everyone had left the James Buchanan Duke statue, and I saw two of the ones in suits walking past the Chapel.”
Again she followed them, but this time they did not sprint away. The pair walked to the traffic circle behind the Bryan Center, where they re-united with a handful of the others. They soon packed in cars and drove away. For Sharp, the night’s adventure was over.
“I think it’s important that they know they’re not consequence-free. They’re not the only people on this campus and they don’t have free reign—or they shouldn’t,” she said.
Audio by Jack Dolgin
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Bre is a senior political science major from South Carolina, and she is the current video editor, special projects editor and recruitment chair for The Chronicle. She is also an associate photography editor and an investigations editor. Previously, she was the editor-in-chief and local and national news department head.
Twitter: @brebradham
Email: breanna.bradham@duke.edu