The club was founded in 1911 by Alexander Smith Cochran, a member of the Yale Class of 1896 and Wolf's Head Society.

The life portrait of the Virgine Queene in the Tea Room, attributed to Federico Zuccari, came with the founder’s original gift.

Began during the literary renaissance at the university between 1909 and 1920, the club attracted such book collectors as Phelps, Chauncey Brewster Tinker, and John Berdan.

The club vault also holds a sample of 16th-century documents, manuscripts (for example, a letter of condolence from Queen Elizabeth to her friend Lady Southwell, 15 October 1598) and medals (one celebrating the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588), as well as various artifacts (a lock of Byron’s hair; a snuff box carved from a mulberry tree planted by Shakespeare at New Place, his home at Stratford; and a guest book signed by many of the club's visitors).

[3][4] Documents relating to the club's organization and activities, including a tradition of formal correspondence written in Latin to the Signet Society at Harvard, are viewable at the online Yale Manuscripts and Archives Collection.

[6] The club is dedicated to conversation, tea, the art of the book, and literature focused on—but not exclusively of—the Elizabethan era.

A 1920 observer[dubious – discuss] noted among certain hopeful signs of the times, current British and American periodicals are neatly lined up on tables, configurations of other little tables, sofas, and chairs provide many nooks for quiet discussion or reading, and upstairs even includes a room dedicated almost entirely to archives of Punch, the former English magazine of humor and satire.

Outside, the club has a deep back garden with a pavilion, understated elegant plantings, and featuring a bust of the Bard himself, to facilitate the enjoyments of finger sandwiches, cookies, and croquet.