There was Walt Emery, the dapper, bow-tied member of the Denver Country Club, and there was the other Emery, whose car was a disaster after his hunting and fishing trips.
“It was a complete 180,” though they were really just two sides of the same man, said his son, Roe Emery of Denver.
Walt Emery, who died at his Denver home Sept. 12, was one of the original owners of the Denver Broncos and a longtime Denver banker. He was 92.
Emery went into business with his father, Roe Emery, who owned a bus company, mountain lodges, a taxi company and other businesses.
When the umbrella business was sold, Walt Emery went into banking. He became president of the Bank of Denver in 1960 and was chairman and chief executive from 1977 until his retirement.
He was a leader in the movement to keep banks locally owned “and was successful for many years,” Roe Emery said.
Walt Emery was a member of the Independent Bankers of Colorado, a group that argued that branch bankers had no interest in local communities, “except to siphon out as much profit as possible,” according to a 1965 Denver Post story.
In 1960, Walt Emery and seven other men put together enough money to start the Denver Broncos. Emery, who had season tickets for decades, was honored for his years of support by the Broncos in 2006 when he was given a team ball in ceremonies at Invesco Field.
Only one of the original owners, who eventually sold the team to the Phipps family, is still living, said his son.
Walt Emery loved fishing and hunting almost as much as he loved the Broncos. He had a green boxcar he used at Barr Lake, where “he concocted some of his best gourmet duck-breast delights,” his children said in their eulogy. But the car usually smelled of wet dogs, and you’d likely sit on a cockleburr.
Roe Emery said his father believed in patience and hard work and was good-natured and generous, but the patience wavered sometimes. “As a kid, I could do a good job of driving him crazy.”
Walter Carpenter Emery was born in Denver on Aug. 5, 1918, and graduated from East High School and Yale University, where he majored in industrial engineering.
An Army captain, he was awarded three Bronze Stars, a Bronze Oak Leaf Cluster and five battle stars.
Emery was on numerous boards, including the National Western Stock Show Association, Denver Urban Renewal Authority and the Colorado State Historical Foundation.
An active Democrat, he aided in several campaigns.
He married Jaynn Mann on June 23, 1944. In addition to her and his son, he is survived by two daughters, Sloan E. Schwindt of Boulder and Victoria Emery of Denver; and five grandchildren.
Virginia Culver: 303-954-1223 or vculver@denverpost.com
