SPURS was founded at Montana State University at Bozeman as an honor society and service club for sophomore women in 1922.

[1][2][3] It was sponsored by the local chapter of Mortar Board honor society to support and encourage student service to the university.

[3] Most chapters volunteered to help with freshmen orientation and homecoming, tutored, and ushered for campus events.

The chapter at Linfield College continued as a local honor society that included sophomores, juniors, and seniors.

[8] The Montana State University SPURS chapter decided to merge with the MSU Student Alumni Foundation the following year, along with the dissolved society Fangs which was a branch of the Intercollegiate Knights.

[11] The name SPURS was the monogram of the society's pillars: Service, Patriotism, Unity, Responsibility, and Sacrifice.