Charles E. Scharlau • Retired Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer | Southwestern Energy Company
When Charles E. Scharlau returned to Arkansas a newly mustered-out Marine at the end of World War II, his father met him at the train station in Cotter, a few miles south and west of where Scharlau grew up just north of Mountain Home.
But instead of saying “Hello, son” or “Glad to have you home,” the elder Scharlau greeted him with the news that the University of Arkansas was delaying freshman registration for returning soldiers, saying “You need to get over there.”
That 100-plus mile bus trip to Fayetteville set the younger Scharlau on a path that would take him to the C-suite of a booming energy company and to a life of giving back to his community.
Having joined the Marines when he was 17, he went to the university on the GI Bill, taking a two-year, pre-law course and graduating from the law school in 1951. Legendary law professor and dean Robert A. Leflar recommended Scharlau for a job at the company that would grow to become Southwestern Energy.
Scharlau went to work there as an attorney and worked at the company in many different positions before eventually becoming its chairman, president and chief executive officer.
He served as a director of Southwestern Energy from 1966 until May 21, 2013. During his time with Southwestern it grew from a small natural gas distribution company with its own gas production in the Arkhoma Basin of Arkansas called Arkansas Western Gas Co. to an exploration and production company that is now the third largest natural gas producer in the United States. It discovered the Fayetteville shale production in Arkansas and now also has production in the Marcellus and Utica shale areas in Pennsylvania and West Virginia as well as properties in Texas, Louisiana, Colorado, Utah and Canada.
Scharlau was involved in all facets of Southwestern Energy Co.’s business for more than 47 years. He also served “of counsel” with the law firm Conner and Winters PLLC.
But Scharlau’s life was much more than just Southwestern Energy and law.
He was married to Clydene Y. Sloop, who passed away in 2012. The Scharlaus had five children: Caryn, Robin, Greg, Charles and Marti.
Scharlau served on the University of Arkansas Board of Trustees from 1997 to 2007 and as chairman of the board for the 2005-2006 academic year. He was chair of the board’s audit committee from 2000 to 2005. He served as president of the Alumni Association, chairman of the National Development Council, chairman of the first large fund raising campaign under then-chancellor Dan Ferritor, vice chairman of the Campaign for the 21st Century, a member of the 2010 Commission and president of the University of Arkansas Foundation.
During the Campaign for the 21st Century, the family created the Scharlau Endowed Chancellor’s Scholarship and the Scharlau Endowed Chair in Chemistry and gifts to the general and law libraries. In 2011, the Scharlaus endowed the Charles & Clydene Scharlau Chair for Hematological Malignancies Research at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences with a gift of $1 million. The chair supports continued development of new treatments and therapies for blood cancers such as multiple myeloma.
In 2015, Scharlau created a second endowed chair at the medical school: the Scharlau Family Endowed Chair in Cancer Research in honor of Kent C. Westbrook, M.D., and Bart Barlogie, M.D., Ph.D. Also in 2015, Scharlau established an endowed chair in presidential leadership to support the University of Arkansas system.
Scharlau was a member of the State Economic Expansion Commission and served terms as a member and as chairman of the state’s energy commission. He has been chairman of the Mineral Law Section of the Arkansas Bar Association and a speaker at their institutes. He also served on the board of directors of the American Gas Association, the Southern Gas Association and the National Association of Manufacturers.
During his time with Southwestern Energy, Scharlau served two terms as president of the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce and three terms as chairman of the board of the Fayetteville Chamber of Commerce. He was a director of ABLEST Inc., from 1980 until it was sold in 2008 and served as the chairman of its compensation committee from 2004.
He chaired the audit committee of the University of Arkansas Foundation, which manages more than $1 billion in assets. He was also a director of Arvest Bank-Fayetteville and the Razorback Foundation. Scharlau has served as a director of the C.H. Heist Corp. of Clearwater, Florida, and of First Arkansas Bankstock Corp. of Little Rock.
One thing that set Scharlau up for success was his upbringing on his family’s acreage outside Mountain Home. The family worked hard, growing much of its own food in a two-acre garden. They raised their own cows for milk, beef for market and hogs to provide the family with meat.
One thing that made a huge impression on the young Scharlau and his later life was when the family inherited an extensive library from an uncle who had been a lawyer. Among the books was a 12-volume set of history, in which he read about leaders such as Napoleon, Alexander the Great and Nero. Also there were books by Mark Twain and a set called The Wit and the Wisdom of America, which included humorous short stories and some not so humorous, like those of Edgar Allan Poe.
Scharlau says he read every one of those books. Because of that, his mother’s guidance and the fact Mountain Home didn’t have television and radio reception was — as he termed it — lousy, Scharlau learned about a larger world where a young man who had never been as far from home as Little Rock until he went away for basic training, soared to success on a life of learning.
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