Denver, CO – The prestigious Friend of the National Western award is celebrated yearly at the exclusive Red Meat Club dinner on Jan. 11, 2024. This year’s award honors the Crow family, with over 100 years of service to the industry spanning three generations. Among the family’s many notable achievements, Dick Crow was a founding father of the Red Meat Club in the mid-1970s with the help of longtime Safeway meat buyer Cecil Hellbusch.
The Crow family is best known for their publication, Western Livestock Journal (WLJ), which the patriarch of the family, Nelson R. Crow, started in 1922. In 1968, the WLJ was passed down to his son, Dick, and in the early 1990s, Nelson’s grandson, Pete, took over the reins.
Producers, commission companies, and packers relied on these papers for price discovery in their markets and other major markets around the country. Nelson quickly expanded the business to include a dairy magazine and a Western crops publication. The WLJ went on to establish a branch office in Denver, CO. At one time, Crow Publications occupied the entire fourth floor of the Livestock Exchange Building at the National Western Center in Denver.
The third generation, Pete, joined the company in 1982, starting as a fieldman in the Southwest. He then moved to Denver to take on other publishing duties. When asked what has kept WLJ relevant and profitable, Pete quickly points out that it’s a combination of hiring the right people, staying on top of the markets, and having excellent original editorial content.
Pete has also taken several principled stands on hot-button issues he thought were important to the industry’s future, knowing it could cost him some circulation. That sums up the Crow family: doing what they felt was right for the industry for over 100 years.
The Red Meat Club dinner on Jan. 11 at the National Western Club honors the Crow family with the prestigious award for Friend of the National Western. Tickets are just $60 per person and include 5:30 pm Happy Hour, 6:30 pm Prime Rib dinner, and guest speaker Mandy Carr Johnson, NCBA senior scientific director.
Tickets can be ordered by calling the National Western Stock Show (NWSS) office at 303-295-6124. Space is limited and tickets are available on a first-come, first-served basis.