Varnell, 90, helped build Denver sports scene

By Jim Benton, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published July 17, 2008 at 11:59 p.m.

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Larry Varnell helped keep the Broncos from moving.

Look at just about every sports venue in Denver and you can see the influence of a longtime sports activist for this town, Larry Varnell.

Mr. Varnell, 90, who died Tuesday of complications from Alz-

heimer's disease, took charge when things needed to be done on the Denver professional sports scene.

Though his vocation was serving as a Central Bank executive, one of his passions was sports.

The Broncos might be in Birmingham, Ala., had he not chaired the Doers Committee, a volunteer group of business people that raised $1.8 million to help keep the Broncos from moving.

In 1967, after the NFL had told the Broncos to expand Bears Stadium from 34,000 to at least 50,000 or the team would be moved, Denver voters turned down, by an almost 3-to-1 margin, a plan to build a stadium.

Knowing NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle favored Birmingham as a potential new home for the Broncos, Mr. Varnell's group raised the money and purchased the stadium from Broncos owners Gerald and Allan Phipps. The Doers Committee gave the stadium to the city of Denver, which then issued revenue bonds that didn't require a vote. With that impetus, the stadium was expanded and renamed Mile High Stadium.

In addition, Coloradans donated Social Security checks and schools made contributions from their fundraising profits.

"What started out as a well-planned strategic campaign turned into an emotional crusade," Mr. Varnell explained a few years ago.

But that was only one of Mr. Varnell's contributions to the Denver sports scene.

In 1990, the Colorado Baseball Commission, led by Mr. Varnell, was successful in getting Denver voters to approve a 0.1 percent sales tax to help finance the building of a stadium that became Coors Field. He also was a member of the Denver and Colorado baseball commissions that helped Denver secure a National League team.

Mr. Varnell also was part of a group that purchased the American Basketball Association franchise that would become known as the Denver Rockets and, eventually, the Denver Nuggets.

He was instrumental in getting the city council to seek voter approval to build an arena, and soon, McNichols Sports Arena was constructed. That arena, with Mr. Varnell's help, played host to the 1990 NCAA men's basketball Final Four.

Mr. Varnell served as head men's basketball coach at Regis College from 1946 to 1951 and was a former Amateur Athletic Union coach and player. He was president of the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame for 26 years and was the first sports director for radio station KLZ and Channel 7.

He is survived by his wife, Jeanne; sons Jeffrey, Joel and Jon; and daughter, Julia Varnell-Sargent.

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