By Rick Moore
The University of Mississippi is a legendary school in America for a number of reasons, and in about a year there will be one more reason: it will be the home of the largest Kappa Alpha Order house, and maybe one of the largest fraternity houses overall, in the nation.
Ground was broken last fall for the construction of the new Alpha Upsilon house at Ole Miss, which is literally across the street from the current house. With construction expected to be finished in the summer of 2025, and a total budget ringing up somewhere in the vicinity of $21 million, the new three-story house will feature many of today’s most modern amenities in 41,000 square feet of space, with 80 bedrooms and kitchen facilities to provide hundreds of meals a day to scores of hungry brothers.
Joseph T. “Joe” Getz (Alpha Upsilon–Mississippi ’78) is not just a KA brother, but is also the president of the Alpha Upsilon Chapter House Corporation, which supervises budgets and capital distribution relating to the housing needs of the chapter. Not only does he hold this position with the Corporation, but he also serves as the president of the Memphis-based law firm of Evans Petree PC. His practice specializes in all areas of construction law, making him a perfect fit for his Corporation role.
Getz said when Trey Horne (Alpha Upsilon–Mississippi ’02), the chapter alumni advisor, asked for his assistance, he was more than willing to lend his expertise. “They had been trying for years to get something off the ground,” he said. “I’m a lawyer but what I do is commercial construction projects, I get projects off the ground, negotiate contracts, handle lawsuits, construction disputes and more. So this is kind of my world every day, and the chapter asked me to get involved and I said I was happy to help.”
“The new house is going to be state-of-the-art,” Getz said, with a hint of both fraternal and fatherly pride in his voice. “Electronic locking systems, security safety cameras, commercial wi-fi, fire sprinklers, state-of-the-art kitchen facilities, a fully dedicated room that all 300 men can meet in chapter together. It’s basically like managing a big multifamily apartment building. We’ve got finishes that are super durable, finished concrete floors for college boys who tend to mess things up for party events and whatnot. We’ve accounted for all that. A big patio area where we’ll have our events and social functions. The house will feature a study cafe where the boys can take their lunch or dinner and study. The house includes a large game room, and during games we have a 120-inch video wall where everybody on Saturday can watch the ball games and hang out. Large outdoor porches with ceiling fans where you can eat or entertain and a huge storage area. It’s going to be massive.”
While Getz is credited with spearheading the project, he’s quick to offer praise and thanks to other KA brothers as well when it comes to handing out recognition for making this project a reality.
“Trey Horne was critical for his knowledge of chapter and house operations,” he said. “David Martineau (Alpha Upsilon–Mississippi ’88) can’t go without being mentioned. He was totally instrumental in this, and his involvement on the national executive council is a big deal. A lot of people have been involved and did a great job. We put together a fundraising effort that has been led by Jon Turner (Alpha Upsilon–Mississippi ’75), who’s done a fantastic job of leading that effort. I’ve been able to mostly focus on the construction and have not had to deal too much with the fundraising. We got a good group of guys working through it, and we had great response for support across a lot of generations, even some brothers over 90 years old have donated.”
Getz’s son, Brennan Getz (Alpha Upsilon–Mississippi ’21), was a resident last year in the existing house. While he loves the new KA house being built right across the street, he said it’s a little bittersweet watching the construction. “We love our current house, it’s great,” he said. “But with this new house we’ll be able to do so much more, have so many more events and just really come together and hang out. Just having a larger place to meet is going to be special because our current house just can’t fit all of us. But just seeing it built, and how cool it’s going to be, it kind of upsets me a little because I’m graduating in May 2025 and it won’t be done until August of 2025. But I’ll make it back for an event or something. I’m definitely planning on visiting.”
Mills Murphy (Alpha Upsilon–Mississippi ’21) is Alpha Upsilon’s current Number I. “I’m really happy for the guys that will be living in it,” he said. “It’s been in the works for a while, but when the ground finally broke it was like, This is real, here it comes. It’s really exciting and I can’t wait to see what it looks like. They’re flying on the construction, it’s just shooting up, it’s huge already. I’m hoping I can put a hard hat on and walk over there pretty soon.”
Brennan Getz and Murphy probably aren’t alone in wishing they were going to get to live in the house. “If somebody is a freshman or sophomore right now they will end up in that house,” Joe Getz said, before joking that “but we have some guys that want to stay longer now.”
Once construction of the new Kappa Alpha house is complete, the Pi Kappa Phi fraternity will move into the existing Kappa Alpha house.
