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The founders of delta sigma pi
Harold Valentine Jacobs
Delta Sigma Pi Founder
1888-1972
Harold Valentine Jacobs was a native New Yorker, born on February 14, 1888 and a graduate of Brooklyn Public School 32 and Commercial High School. With an interest in accounting, Jacobs entered New York University’s School of Commerce, Accounts and Finance for the standard three-year, two-hours-a-night, five-nights-a-week program that led to the bachelor of commercial science degree. During the day, he worked as a junior accountant for the Wall Street firm that became KPMG, taking a horse car from the Park Slope section of Brooklyn, down Flatbush Avenue to the Brooklyn Bridge, across the river to Manhattan, and then a short walk to work. On the trip home after class Jacobs was drawn to three of his classmates, Alexander Makay, Henry Albert Tienken, and Alfred Moysello. These four young men established the Fraternity that came to be known as Delta Sigma Pi.
Alexander Frank Macay
Delta Sigma Pi Founder
1888-1951
Alexander Frank Makay was born in New York City on May 21, 1888 and attended public schools there. In 1930, his last name was legally changed to Mackay.
Makay graduated from New York University and continued a life-long association with NYU as an alumnus. As an undergraduate, he was a football and track star and later served on the athletic council. Makay deserves much of the credit for NYU’s days of gridiron greatness, having coaxed Chick Meehan to leave Syracuse and become head coach at NYU where he put together football teams that were the best in the East.
Despite a busy practice in the accounting firm bearing his name, Makay was active in several clubs in and around New York but none eclipsed Delta Sigma Pi, the Fraternity he founded along with three other men. In the early days of the Fraternity, Makay was a member of several national committees and served on the Delta Sigma Pi Board for six years. On the day of his death, he was to have hosted a Fraternity function at his home at Sea Cliff, Long Island, New York.
Makay and his wife, Marion, had one daughter. His brother, William J. Makay, was a later member of the Alpha Chapter of Delta Sigma Pi.
Alfred Moysello
Delta Sigma Pi Founder
1884-1941
Alfred Moysello was born in Naples, Italy on April 20, 1884. He came to the United States at an early age and received his formal education in New York City public schools. He attended City College of New York and then enrolled in New York University in 1906. With tremendous personality, he was one of the most popular students at the university and participated wholeheartedly in all the activities of the class.
He joined with three of his classmates to establish Delta Sigma Pi at NYU, and, as a Fraternity brother, exemplified the purposes of the Fraternity. His friendliness and personality were distinct chapter assets.
In the early years, Delta Sigma Pi’s Alpha Chapter maintained summer homes on the seashore and these were an important factor in creating the Fraternity spirit so badly needed in the critical early days of Delta Sigma Pi. Moysello was one of the leaders in this movement.
In his career, he was connected with the Board of Education of Brooklyn for many years and gave much of his time to the study of juvenile delinquency and child psychology.
Moysello was in attendance at Delta Sigma Pi’s 13th Grand Chapter Congress in Philadelphia in 1939 and is well remembered for the active interest in Delta Sigma Pi he displayed throughout his life. He was married and had one son, Alfred Moysello, Jr.
Henry Albert Tienken
Delta Sigma Pi Founder
1887-1949
Henry Albert Tienken was born in Brooklyn, New York, on September 7, 1887, the third of five children. He attended New York University, graduating in 1909 with a degree of bachelor of commercial studies. While in school, he founded Delta Sigma Pi along with three of his classmates.
From 1910 to 1918, Tienken worked as an accountant for an American oil company in Argentina, after which he founded Weiss and Tienken, a lumber farm in Chile. In June of 1919, he returned for a six-month visit to the United States, his only and last trip to his homeland. It is believed that during that visit he was in contact with one of the other founders of Delta Sigma Pi.
After closing his lumber company, Tienken worked in the oil industry in Argentina, with a railroad firm in Bolivia, in the nitrate industry in Chile, and as an accountant for the Huanchaca Tin Mines in Bolivia. He also undertook mercury mining on his own in Bolivia, although the venture proved risky. In September, 1944, Tienken joined the Rubber Development Corporation, a U.S. Government Agency, serving in Bolivia and Brazil. When the R.D.C. closed in 1948, Tienken was offered a return trip to the United States, but he remained in South America to stay close to his children, including George, a Deltasig initiate at Kappa in 1970.
Tienken died and was buried in Oruro, Bolivia, January 18, 1949. Tienken was greatly respected, leading a simple life and remaining confident and pleasant in spite of often difficult circumstances. To him, the great gifts in life were trust in God, and physical, mental and moral strength and health.
