University of Colorado president Hank Brown remembers, at 8 years old, going to the brand-new Denver Coliseum for the National Western Stock Show with all of his grandparents. It was a huge, jubilant crowd, and the building was fresh and new.
The events, though, were the same.
“The show has been pretty constant, much like it used to be,” said Brown, a former U.S. senator and congressman, and former vice president of Monfort, a large Greeley-based cattle operation. “The industry itself has been revolutionized with mechanization and automation . . . but it’s a reminder of what we are.”
Brown was named the 2008 Citizen of the West by the National Western Stock Show & Rodeo, an award given to a person who represents the determination of a Western pioneer.
The CU president, who is set to resign that post this year, said he’s never been involved in any work that has as much integrity as the livestock industry.
“It’s still a business where people trade millions of dollars based on their word, and they managed to do an awful lot without the blessings of lawyers,” said Brown, himself a lawyer.
In a lifetime of high-level careers that took him all over the world, Brown said the one thing that makes the West different is how people value their word.
“People tend to place more value on their word than in other parts of the country,” said Brown, 67. “I think people tend to be much more open and direct.”
Brown’s direct, yet kind, approach to leadership is widely credited for pulling CU out of a mire of scandal with its troubled football program that resulted in a multimillion-dollar settlement.
Observers say his professional statesmanship has been a boon to higher education statewide as he has lobbied for more funding.
