Kappa Kappa Gamma (), also known simply as Kappa or KKG, is a collegiate sorority founded at Monmouth College in Monmouth, Illinois, United States. It has a membership of more than 260,000 women, with 140 collegiate chapters in the United States and Canada and 307 alumni associations worldwide. It is sometimes referred to by its original designation, a women's fraternity, as it was founded before the term "sorority" was coined. It is a founding member of the National Panhellenic Conference (NPC), an umbrella organization that includes 26 American sororities. History In 1869, two students at Monmouth College in Monmouth, Illinois, Mary Louise Bennett and Hannah Jeannette Boyd, were dissatisfied with the fact that, while men enjoyed membership in fraternities, women had few equivalent organizations for companionship, support, and advancement, and were instead limited to literary societies. Bennett and Boyd decided to create a women's fraternity and sought members "not only for literary work, but also for social development", beginning with their friend Mary Moore Stewart. Stewart, Boyd, and Bennett met in the Amateurs des Belles Lettres Hall, a literary society of which the women were active members, to plan their new society. They recruited three additional women, Anna Elizabeth Willits, Martha Louisa Stevenson, and Susan Burley Walker, to join in founding the fraternity. The six founders met at Willit's home to begin work on establishing the Alpha chapter of Kappa Kappa Gamma. They chose a golden key as their badge and had badges crafted by Bennett's family jeweler for their official debut. A formal charter for the fraternity was drawn up by Stewart's father, who was an attorney in the state of Illinois. On October 13, 1870, the founders publicized their intention to organize as a women's fraternity by entering the Monmouth Chapel, a public campus venue, wearing their golden key badges in their hair. Although the groundwork of the organization began as early as 1869, the 1876 Convention voted to recognize as the official Founders Day since no earlier charter date could be determined. In 1871, the fraternity chartered its Beta chapter at nearby St. Mary's Seminary. The next year, the fraternity opened its Gamma chapter at Smithson College and Delta chapter at Indiana University. Though the Beta and Gamma chapters failed to survive more than a few years, the Delta chapter became the fraternity's oldest continuously active chapter (Alpha was temporarily closed in 1874 but later re-established) and