Bound by Black and Gold: The Shafer Family's ESU Legacy

by Phillip Tutor

Emporia, KS (09/24/2025) — Not everyone in the Shafer family has an unbreakable personal connection to Emporia State University.

But it does seem that way.

Fourteen members of the Shafer family are ESU alumni - 10 with bachelor's degrees and four with master's degrees. Two others attended classes at ESU. One family member is enshrined in the ESU Athletics Hall of Honor. Another has served with ESU Police and Safety for more than four decades. And an uncanny number of Shafers met their spouses while they were Hornet underclassmen.

It's no wonder, then, that the ESU Alumni Association has selected the Shafers as the 2025 recipients of the Hornet Heritage Family Award, given annually to a multi-generational family of ESU alumni and former students. The Shafers will be recognized Sept. 27 during the Hornets' Family Day football game against Pittsburg State.

"We are just Emporia State people," said Margaret (Shafer) Wells, who earned her Early Childhood certificate at ESU in 1999. "Every fall, we have one game that we all come to and we tailgate. We've done that for years. We all have Emporia State tags on our cars. We've just always loved Emporia State."

Cupid also had a hand in the Shafers' ESU connections. "I think we all came here single and left with a spouse," said Don Shafer, one of Wells' brothers.

The Shafers' path to ESU originated in Winfield, Kansas. The four Shafer children - Janet (Shafer) Carson, John Shafer, Margaret Wells and Don Shafer - grew up with parents who supported education. That was especially true with their father, who despite earning a college scholarship in the early 1940s, could barely cover the cost of his textbooks. "If we wanted to go to college," Carson recalls, "he always told us he'd find a way to get us there."

Three of the Shafer children earned ESU degrees or attended ESU - Carson, Wells and Don Shafer. From there, though, their family tree's Hornet connections branch out in multiple directions.

Wells' husband, Bob Wells, graduated from ESU in 1975. Each of the Wells' children, Joel Wells and Ashley Wells Muninger, hold ESU degrees, as do their spouses, Sarah Waring Wells and Barry Muninger. (Barry Muninger's mom, Lin Goza Muninger, played for the 1980 Hornet Softball team that is in the Hall of Honor.) Carson's son, Grant Carson, received his ESU degree in 2012, and his spouse, Kali Carson, is a former ESU student. Don Shafer, the longtime ESU Police officer, met his wife, two-time ESU graduate Roberta Kolb Shafer, on campus. Not only did that trend trickle down to their daughter, Meghan Shafer McGinnis, who also met her husband, Michael McGinnis, at ESU, they held their wedding on campus.

When the Shafers gather to tailgate this fall, the group will include current and retired teachers, school administrators, a Kansas Bureau of Investigation manager, a game warden, a corporate general manager, a communications director and a rehabilitation hospital CEO - and likely more. What unites them all are family ties and deep connections to ESU.

"All of us have always felt that it's a nice, welcoming campus," Carson said. "You walk on campus, and you immediately feel like you're home."