Sigs Honor Merlin Olsen’s Charitable Spirit

On Sept. 15, 2014, Sigs across North America spent the day serving their communities in honor of the Merlin Olsen Day of Service.
The Sigs at the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga, pictured above, volunteered their time at a local grade school by clearing brush from the building’s driveway, and picking up litter that had accumulated around the school grounds. As a token of appreciation, the school’s principal told the Sigs to use the school’s athletic fields for their intramural sports team practices.
The 2014 Merlin Olsen Day of Service was truly a nationwide phenomenon: The members of the chapter at the University of Richmond cleaned the banks of the local James River of trash and debris; the Sigs at the Cal. State-Northridge chapter filled more than two dozen garbage bags with litter from local streets; and the Valparaiso Sigs braved the rainy weather in order to clean a local stretch of highway. Thirty-seven Sigs at the University of Montana volunteered their services to the Human Resource Development Council, the members of the Cal. State-Sacramento chapter participated in their local Adopt-a-Highway program, and brothers of the chapter at Beloit College helped renovate a local church that was in need of repair.
Finally, in Evanston, Ill., members of the Sigma Chi International Fraternity Headquarters staff rolled up their sleeves and donated blood to Lifesource, which supplies most of the blood used in transfusions in the Chicagoland metropolitan area. The blood bank brought a mobile donation bus to the Headquarters parking lot and took donors throughout the workday.
The event is named for Significant Sig and Order of Constantine Sig Merlin Olsen, UTAH STATE 1962, who is best remembered for his Pro Football Hall of Fame career with the Los Angeles Rams as a member of the “Fearsome Foursome” defensive line. Off the field, though, Olsen was dedicated to improving his community by volunteering and raising money for charities such as Children’s Miracle Network.
For more information about the Merlin Olsen Day of Service, email honormerlin@sigmachi.org.