When Pi Kappa Alpha Ran ACAmania at the University of Maryland

May 27, 2026 by Shawn Collins

It was early 1989 when my PiKA brother, Rich Dickson, mentioned at one of our chapter meetings that the fraternity would be running a large-scale, multi-day sale of ACA JOE clothing to benefit Family Stress Services in Washington, D.C.

Dickson’s mother ran the retailer, ACA JOE, at the time, and Rich organized ACAmania with some other fraternity brothers. The event took place at Ritchie Coliseum on the University of Maryland campus.

The whole building was filled with tables with merchandise from ACA JOE, and all of us helped to put out clothes, ring up sales, etc. I guess we were selling all of their clearance items, since the prices were cheap, and tons of students came through and bought the gear.

I have no idea how well the final sales went, but $5,000 was donated to Family Stress Services, and the clothing we sold was all over campus for years after. I bought a bunch of stuff, including some rugby shirts with thin, colorful stripes and a blue jacket with shoulder pads (I regretted that one, but wore it for a while because I needed a jacket).

As we were promoting the event, a photographer came to the fraternity house to get a picture of us all wearing our ACA JOE t-shirts on the front porch.

They made posters from the picture, which were displayed at the ACA JOE stores, and I still have my copy. But those clothes are long gone.

In the December 1989 edition of Shield and Diamond (the magazine from the national headquarters of Pi Kappa Alpha), the recap of our chapter (Delta Psi) mentioned ACAmania…

Delta Psi chapter also presented an ACAMANIA weekend in April, a giant clothing sale which raised money for Family Stress Services in Washington, D.C., to help fight child abuse.

There was more coverage in the Shield & Diamond chapter notes in the March 1990 issue about the first ACAmania and the upcoming second event.

ACA-MANIA was a major effort put forth this year by the chapter. Pioneered by Rich Dickson, with a hard-working support staff including Andrew Auwerda, Rob Bruno, and Joe Millman, this venture has been widely successful. The chapter is now on the verge of the second annual ACA-MANIA at Maryland, and several similar undertakings have been launched at Pike chapters around the country. The three-day public awareness and fundraising event is designed to bring attention to the problem of child abuse and is underwritten by ACA JOE, a leading men’s specialty retail chain.

Family Stress Services, the D.C. Chapter National Committee for Prevention of Child Abuse, was the recipient of a $5,000 donation. Judy L. Rhodes, Executive Director of Family Stress Services, writes: “I have never been more impressed. The organizational and managerial skills that your fraternity displayed would give credit to some of the best public relations and fundraising firms on the East Coast.

You designed and orchestrated this project with obvious respect for professionalism. Everything from T-shirts and poster design to radio, television, and print media coverage was completed with an eye for detail and perfection. You were able to secure not just public service announcements, but in-depth interviews with noted personalities.

You managed to acquire, display, and sell (at +50% discount!) quality merchandise from ACA JOE, a very reputable clothier. You even managed to salvage the event from a major rainstorm. The other support activities – soft drink and food sales, lotteries, and a disk jockey-topped an already impressive function.” Congratulations to Delta Psi on a job well done.

And after all of these years, what’s Brother Dickson up to? He’s been the CEO of Gap, Inc. since the summer of 2023, after working as President of Mattel, where he made Barbie relevant again.

Originally published at https://shawncollins512.substack.com.

Related