The only thing thicker than the crowd of brothers seated around him is his accent. His Tennessee drawl is marked by long vowels that pair well with unhurried narratives of days gone by. To this college-aged crowd, the voice of Steve Shanklin, Murray State ’70, seems to carry with it the weight and memories of SigEp’s Founders.

The scene is the 2013 Dallas Conclave. Shanklin is sharing stories about colorful characters from SigEp’s past, suspender-wearing Fraternity men with a taste for whiskey and cigars. The gang erupts in laughter as Shanklin nails his punch line.

They’ve let their guard down, and Shanklin knows it. He shifts to a story of brotherhood that penetrates the soul, reminding his young audience of the Fraternity’s emotional power.

This experience is reproduced at nearly every event Shanklin attends. He’s become an unofficial historian in a fraternity filled with official titles. Exceedingly humble, Shanklin is quick to diminish his own importance; but his life’s work has put him at the center of some of the most critical moments of SigEp’s last half-century.

An accountant with a preacher’s gift, Shanklin has made SigEp his ministry for over four decades. He often speaks of standing on the shoulders of giants, and he’s certainly met his share. Though he has worked alongside Founders and national program namesakes, perhaps Shanklin’s greatest gift has been bridging generational divides. He started in college and continues today, connecting brothers across the decades and pushing the newest generation to further SigEp’s journey of innovation.

Living values

Forty-seven years ago, a young Shanklin initially rejected fraternity membership at Murray State, a decision quite common for the day. The Vietnam War raged; U.S. casualties were skyrocketing; fraternities were struggling to keep members. The stakes were simply higher.

“If you had a bad test, you had more than just a bad semester,” Shanklin remembers, alluding to the risk of losing draft deferment, which kept college students on campus and out of Southeast Asia.

But Shanklin did eventually join a fraternity. It was a local fraternity with big dreams of becoming more. His chapter brothers recognized the importance of a national affiliation and footprint, but they struggled to find a group that shared their values.

“It was my responsibility to find a national fraternity to affiliate our local with,” Shanklin explains. “And that was the first chance I had to look at not just a fraternity, but fraternities as a whole.” He remembers feeling that values had become social relics for many fraternities.

The men at Murray State eventually found SigEp and went on to become the fifth chapter in the state of Kentucky. They were impressed by the Fraternity’s ability to make turn-of-the-century values relevant for a new generation of students.

“We chose Sigma Phi Epsilon, not for what it was, but for what it stood for, and what we felt … as a local fraternity, was the potential for the future,” Shanklin recalls. “When most national fraternities had pledge manuals … our book was referred to as “Educating for Brotherhood.” They had pledge trainers; ours were pledge educators. You train animals—you educate people.”

“A breath of fresh air”

Fresh out of school and with a draft number still not called up, Shanklin enlisted instead with the national Fraternity as a ‘staff representative,’ a position later called regional director. It was a strange time for America, and SigEp was not immune from the turbulence.

“We had a lot of problems with young men who were searching, really searching … to find themselves and a sense of value in the world,” Shanklin remembers.

“McCaul stood up very carefully, and with his cane, put his dinner napkin on to the top … a red napkin, that he swirled in the air. It was like throwing gas onto a flame. You could feel the the thundering of feed in the room, stomping in the applause.”

To survive, SigEp and men like Shanklin would need to innovate, starting at the top. From 1967 to 1971, “the top” meant Grand President Edward Zollinger, William & Mary ’27, the only SigEp to serve two consecutive terms in the role.

“Zollinger would use us as sounding boards,” says Shanklin. “He would come to us for facts and opinions … and say, ‘Tell us what you really think.’”

Zollinger genuinely listened to the younger and increasingly disenfranchised generation. Despite his status as an IBM executive, he made time for these brothers. He and his wife, Lucille, drove many miles to visit with chapters, listening and reassuring young men that SigEp’s values were still relevant. His philosophy and humble work ethic trickled down to the Headquarters staff.

Shanklin remembers proudly that Fraternity Insider, an inter-fraternal publication of the era, “said we were, I think they used the term, ‘a breath of fresh air’ … the most aggressive and energetic staff any fraternity had ever put on the road.” Shanklin also remembers the leadership of Chapter Services Director Chuck White, Western Michigan ’62. “White was a real innovator. If he couldn’t think of it himself, he’d provoke others to come up with ideas that would push the Fraternity forward,” Shanklin says. “Zollinger and White really pushed us from one of the also-rans, a not-so-bad fraternity, into a major force in the fraternity world.”

The 1971 Atlanta Conclave occurred amidst the national discontent and halfway through Shanklin’s staff tenure. It was an event White described as the “tail-end of our critical period.” Those late summer days would bear witness to a changing of the guard.

That Conclave, SigEp’s last surviving founder, Thomas Vaden McCaul, Richmond 1903, addressed an assembly of brothers that Shanklin remembers as exhibiting “the conflict in society. Fellows with hair down past their shoulders, guys with high and tight haircuts; it was the face of society in Sigma Phi Epsilon.”

McCaul, “quite frail and unable to hear,” needed help to the podium, Shanklin recalls. “He thanked the men for helping make our Fraternity what it was today, and as you might expect, challenged them to do even more in the future.”

Shanklin remembers an applause that lasted 20 minutes: “Young men were standing on tables, cheering, hoisting others up on to their shoulders.”

What happened next would be a moment frozen in SigEp history. “McCaul stood up very carefully, and with his cane, put his dinner napkin on to the top … a red napkin, that he swirled in the air. It was like throwing gas onto a flame,” Shanklin smiles. “You could feel the thundering of feet in the room, stomping in the applause.” Different haircuts, same values.

That Conclave, McCaul’s last, also marked the election of the first Student Directors to the Fraternity’s National Board. SigEp had built a bridge to the next generation.

Turning a Corner

Shanklin followed his year on the road with one volunteer role after the next.

“Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Arkansas, Indiana, North Carolina, Missouri,” Shanklin pauses. “If I didn’t mention Illinois, I should.” He has worked with so many chapters it’s hard to keep track. Shanklin has lots of fond memories from his early years as a volunteer, but things started to change in the 1980s. The economy had improved, and SigEp benefitted from the stability. Still, Shanklin saw something much darker.

“We had a lot of young men who were still being hazed in chapters, and young men who would put up with almost anything rather than suffer the social stigma of removing themselves from membership,” Shanklin says. “Unfortunately some young men took their own lives to avoid the abuse.” Shanklin knew SigEp had found its next big challenge. He was not alone. Donald McCleary, Texas-Austin ’71, who traveled alongside Shanklin in the Vietnam days, was now Grand President. McCleary established SigEp’s Committee on Self- Esteem to investigate the problem. Their conclusion: the pledge process was broken. However it happened, pledging had become antithetical to SigEp values.

At the 1991 Conclave, undergraduates weighed in. They agreed and issued a mandate for the transformation of the pledging process. Past Grand President and inter-fraternal leader Frank Ruck, Michigan ’46, accepted the challenge and formed a new task force—the Committee on Pledge Transformation. Shanklin was invited to join.

“I went there with some biases,” Shanklin admits, speaking about the committee’s initial summit in Boulder, Colo. Often going to bat for the underdog, the forgotten chapter or the disenfranchised member, Shanklin was reluctant to jump to conclusions until every side had been heard. Ultimately, he admits, the answer came down to core values.

“We were trying to recapture the spirit of the Founders,” Shanklin explains. “There were no pledges back in those days. They sought an association … based on a set of common values and appreciation. And they literally taught each other by being with each other.”

The committee developed the Balanced Man Program, and by 1993 Conclave delegates had adopted it as SigEp’s new development model.

Breaking Through

The heat index is an unbearable 99, and again Shanklin is surrounded by a hoard of brothers. He stands by a lake at the center of the University of Richmond campus during the 2014 Ruck Leadership Institute. He calls the water a metaphor for the great distance that SigEp has traveled since 1901.

Mid-thought, Shanklin pauses. “Follow me,” he says, before racing up a hill and through a tree line. The men are thrown by the sudden detour and stand still.

Eventually, they follow and find Shanklin through the brush. He’s standing in a reproduction of a Greek amphitheater. It’s a stage for university plays, but the significance is clear. The men realize this is no detour.

“Sometimes the path to the pinnacle of the Greek world is not the one anybody else sees,” Shanklin tells them. “It’s the one of possibility that somebody dares to see.”

Shanklin smiles at the familiar look on their faces. Perhaps it reminds him of his own feelings when he first followed Frank Ruck in the early days of the Balanced Man Program.

“Sometimes the path to the pinnacle of the Greek world is not the one anybody else sees,” Shanklin tells them. “It’s the one of possibility that somebody dares to see. Somebody like Frank Ruck, who was the spirit behind the Balanced Man Project.” Shanklin knows that if SigEp is to continue pushing onward, a new generation will need to reach across the divide to learn from the past and rise up to the challenges of today.

“Here’s where I step back and ask you the question,” Shanklin says. “What’s that next big thing that will help us raise expectations for us and for all of the fraternity world?”

“That’s not a rhetorical question,” Shanklin says. “What do you plan to do?”