The Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity House is a historic fraternity house in Moscow, Idaho. It was built in 1932 for the Idaho Alpha chapter of Sigma Alpha Epsilon at the University of Idaho. The house was designed by architect Charles I. Carpenter in the Colonial Revival style. It has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since December 31, 1993.
The first chapter house of the Idaho Alpha chapter of Sigma Alpha Epsilon was at 904 Deakin, the intersection of Deakin Street and College Avenue, close to the student union building. ZXA, a newly established local fraternity, rented the boarding house in 1916 after the Gamma Phi Beta sorority moved into its newly built chapter house across from the Administration Building Lawn where the music building is now. ZXA successfully petitioned the national Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity for a charter in 1919. The first SAE chapter house capacity of approximately 20 men was expanded in a 1923 remodel but toward the end of the 1920s the SAE chapter had again outgrown the building.
The goal of the local ZXA fraternity and then the SAE chapter was to be the dominant fraternity at the University of Idaho. Searching for a location that would support this goal, the house corporation found a corner lot several blocks away at the intersection of Deakin Street and Sweet Avenue that was occupied by a two-story house and a small barn. Although the lot was at the edge of campus it was considered a perfect location to build an imposing chapter house. Across Sweet Avenue was the newly planted arboretum and there were empty fields behind the property available for football and baseball games. Although Sweet Avenue was a muddy rutted dirt road, it connected to the slowly improving North South Highway that connected Moscow with Lewiston and southern Idaho. The new SAE chapter house was designed by Spokane architect Charles I. Carpenter who also was the architect for a number of public buildings during his career that included court houses, city halls and lodge buildings in Spokane and Moscow. Carpenter chose the Colonial Revival building style for the SAE chapter house to maximize interior living space for the construction dollar.
The SAE chapter house is set diagonally on its large corner lot, facing the intersection of Deakin and Sweet streets. Because the lot drops considerably from front to rear, the full height of the basement is exposed at the rear and sides of the building but not on the facade. An asphalt driveway provides access for delivery vans and student parking at the rear. A narrower semicircular cement drive installed in the 1950s crosses the lot in front of the house. Today mature landscaping in the front includes shrubs, large spruce and birch trees. The front lawn is crossed by a concrete walkway leading from the intersection to the front door.
The large chapter house was rapidly built in months partly due to the ample inexpensive labor available in the Great Depression. Architectural plans were completed in early 1932, and construction began in the spring. Contractors completed the excavation and poured footings by late May, laid the brick walls during the next two months and finished the roof before the end of July. Workmen kept on schedule allowing fraternity members to move into their new quarters before the start of the new school year in September 1932.
The 150,000 bricks used to build the SAE chapter house were produced by the Moscow Fire Brick & Clay Products in kilns located on Sweet Avenue close to the North South Highway. This Moscow company also manufactured the bricks used in many of the downtown Moscow and University of Idaho buildings built in the 1920s to 1950s.
Newspaper articles reported that the fraternity's new chapter house costing $52,145 in 1932 dollars (about $990,000 in 2020 dollars) was the most expensive in the Pacific Northwest. The 1931 lot purchase and construction the next year was financed by alumni donations, cashed in life insurance policies, undergraduate SAE's gold panning profits, sale of the 904 chapter house and the purchase of a $10,000 bond with a 2 1/2 percent interest rate by Charles Bocock (Illinois Beta 1899) a SAE alumni brother who was the president of the Albion State Normal School in Albion, Idaho.