When Denver won the Democratic National Convention, Sen. Barack Obama had just started a presidential exploratory committee.
And now, 19 months later, Elbra Wedgeworth is awestruck by the historic convergence.
“To be a black woman from east Denver, having this here, is great,” said Wedgeworth, president of the host committee. “Words can’t even describe it, or my role in it.”
Landing the convention in Denver would become a team effort that included everyone from the mayor to the business community, but at the very beginning, it was just Wedgeworth.
In 2005, Howard Dean, newly elected chairman of the Democratic National Committee, came to town for a reception sponsored by Colorado Democrats, and during a question-and-answer period, Wedgeworth shot up her hand, grabbing his attention.
“We have hosted major events like World Youth Day, Summit of the Eight, and the All-Star Game,” she said. “If we can host the pope, we can host 35,000 Democrats. What do you think, Gov. Dean?”
He didn’t say much — just observed that the bid process would start in January 2006.
Others, however, had a lot to say.
“People thought I had lost my mind and we could never pull this off,” said Wedgeworth, who was then president of the Denver City Council.
But she knew her friend, lawyer Steven Farber, had been appointed by President Clinton in 1998 to the site-selection committee for the 2000 Democratic convention.
Back then, Denver didn’t have the requisite number of hotels, so Farber included on the application Wyoming hotels in Casper and Cheyenne, trying valiantly to convince DNC officials that Casper was a mere 20 minutes away.
In 2000, there were three finalists: Denver, Los Angeles and Boston. Los Angeles won that year, and Boston in 2004.
Now, Wedgeworth figured, it was time for Denver.
Farber still remembers getting her call.
“She said, ‘How would you like to bring the Democratic convention to Denver?’ ” he recalled. “I said, ‘That all over again?’ ”
But she persuaded the powerful fundraiser to become her co-chair.
She also reached out to another friend, lawyer Willie Shepherd.
“I knew it would be an uphill battle but that it certainly was in our grasp,” says Shepherd, now the host- committee finance chair. “We thought we could showcase Denver and the politics of the New West, particularly relative to the Democratic Party.”
Political leadership of the Mountain West states was shifting from Republican to Democratic, and Denver could finally boast the clout of infrastructure.
During his third term as mayor, Wellington Webb had sold voters a bond issue to expand the Colorado Convention Center complex, and he had negotiated a deal to build a convention-center hotel, the Hyatt Regency.
Webb also was instrumental in the creation of the Pepsi Center and Invesco Field at Mile High, which gave Denver two modern downtown stadiums for Democratic platforms and speeches.
“It was always my view that if you build a great enough city, then we could get many of the top conventions that we didn’t get before because we’d have the ability and structure to house them,” he said.
As Farber, Shepherd and Wedgeworth raised $400,000 for the bid process, they labored to create a 600-page bid book that weighed 15 pounds.
Of the 35 cities that applied, the number finally narrowed to three: Denver, Minneapolis and New York.
DNC committee members flew to Denver one morning and were treated to breakfast at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House.
“We looked out from the stage,” Farber said. “It was a beautiful scene. We said, ‘Going back 98 years, the DNC was held at this very spot. William Jennings Bryan delivered his acceptance speech at the spot where we are talking today.’
“I saw their eyes and reactions and feelings, and walked out thinking, ‘OK, it is ours to lose.’ ”
Colleen O’Connor: 303-954-1083 or coconnor@denverpost.com
