Hugh W. Killebrew, Jr.
Hugh was a leader in the ski industry. He gave freely of his time and talents for the benefit of every ski area in the nation. A prominent tax attorney, he headed up the NSAA Tax Committee and on many occasions engaged in legal battle with the IRS on the subject of Investment Tax Credit for ski lifts. His efforts resulted in court decisions benefiting every ski area in the nation. On learning of his death, a CPA for a large eastern ski area told me, “Ski areas will never realize the thousands of dollars Hugh Killebrew saved them.” Hugh was also a member of the NSAA Board of Directors for the past nine years, and I cannot recall when he ever missed a meeting. He also served as a member of the Federal Relations Committee, and there are many government officials who know he was a tough man to do battle with. Whenever Hugh was called upon to go to Washington to help out with a problem, we could always count on him to re-arrange his busy schedule and be there.
Hugh was a man of his convictions who spoke right up and said what was on his mind. When he spoke it meant something, and you always knew where you stood with him. It was not uncommon at NSAA Board Meetings for Hugh and Tom Corcoran to hotly debate important issues, but when they were done with their verbal sparring, it was the industry that was the beneficiary.
Hugh had a good sense of humor and he always enjoyed a good time — particularly with his colleagues in the industry. Many jokingly called him “Heavenly Hugh,” and he would always reply “Thank you.” At an end-of-a-season party, his employees once gave him a “Heavenly Hugh” t-shirt of which he was very proud. He once told me that when he was busy and did not want to be disturbed he instructed his secretary to tell his callers he was out walking on the lake. He was a proud man, and because of his many accomplishments in life, he had every right to be. I had the good fortune to spend a little time with Hugh at Heavenly Valley just a few days before his tragic accident. He took great pride in showing me the aerial photos and maps of his massive mountain complex and the expansion he had planned leading up to the 1982 World Ski Championships at Heavenly Valley. It was obvious to me that this prestigious world competition would be “the topping-off” of his successful career in the ski business.
Hugh was a graduate of the University of California and received his law degree in 1949 from the University of San Francisco. During World War II he served with distinction as a U.S. Naval submarine officer. He and his good friend Frank Snyder, also a veteran submarine officer, took great delight in comparing their war-time services.
Hugh was always accompanied by his lovely wife, Eleanor, at NSAA conventions and meetings. In addition to his wife he is survived by his mother, a son, two daughters, a stepson and two granddaughters.
The ski industry today is better off because of Hugh Killebrew. He stood tall among the leaders. He’ll be sadly missed as a good friend by us all.
Cal Conniff —NSAA Executive Director
A correction
In our comments on these pages in the Summer issue about prices at The Homestead, we made two errors of fact, for which we apologize and set the record straight.
The daily charge for hotel guests who want valet parking is $1.25, not $2 as we stated. Secondly, the hamburger (6 oz freshly ground beef) on toasted bun, as served in the snack bar, costs $2.50, not $3.85 as we stated.
An apology to Mr. Callaway
The July issue of Harper’s is entitled, “The persecution and character assassination of Howard (Bo) Callaway as performed by inmates of the U. S. Senate under the auspices of the Democratic party.” It is long; it is brilliantly researched and written; it is chilling.
To refresh memories, Mr. Callaway became Secretary of the Army in May of 1973 and left to become President Ford’s campaign manager in July 1975. He had taken control of Crested Butte ski area in Colorado in 1970.
The Harper’s article painstakingly reconstructs the story of how seeds of suspicion about Bo Callaway were deliberately sown, nurtured and ultimately harvested in the form of Callaway’s resignation as Ford’s campaign manager. It is a tale told in devastating detail. The luckless hero is Bo Callaway; the many villains are headed by Senator Floyd Haskell (D-Colorado) who presided as chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on the Environment and Land Resources in its inquiry on whether Callaway had used his office as Secretary of the Army to further his financial interests in Crested Butte. Another villain of a sort is Miles Arber, publisher of the Crested Butte Chronicle, whose innuendos of wrongdoing by Callaway provided Haskell with the original smoke alarm.
In a way, though, the biggest villain in the Harper’s article is the press, both print and broadcast. Whether it was Jim Polk of NBC Television, or Kyle Lawson of the Gunnison County Times, or the Denver Post “broadside” or Time magazine’s “Curtains for Callaway” approach, it was a classic Trial by Headline situation by the press, according to author Hougan. More on this later.
The article goes on to show how the investigation killed Callaway politically; how Haskell manipulated the timing of his committee’s report for greatest damage to Callaway; how the report twisted the knife in Callaway and utterly failed to clear Callaway despite the positive exculpatory evidence given by every single witness; how Haskell got the report accepted by the committee using the proxy of Senator Church (D-Idaho) who had neither attended the hearings nor even read the report.
We quote two sentences which pretty well sum up the whole: “This is a Washington story, which is to say that it deals with the technique of character assassination and . . . with the tactical use of false appearances, public pieties and moral fraud . . . The object of the attack was not so much Callaway himself, but the Presidential campaign of President Ford, which (at the very least) can be said to have come unstuck in the shadow of a Colorado peak known as Snodgrass Mountain.”
We call our readers’ attention to this vivid article for several reasons, not the least of which is to urge you to get hold of a copy and read it. You should know more about your fellow ski area operator, Howard “Bo” Callaway.
But more importantly for me, I want to apologize to Mr. Callaway for my handling of the Crested Butte/ Callaway news item in the Spring ’76 issue of Ski Area Management. Not content with reporting the facts as we knew them, we had to indulge in nudges, knowing winks and smart-ass wisecracks to enliven the story and to make sure our readers knew that we can recognize a Washington pol with his hand in the till when we see one.
Well, we didn’t and we can’t. My apologies, Mr. Callaway. And my sincere best wishes for a rewarding and happy tenure as a ski resort operator.
David Rowan
