Advisory Council

Bob Greenlee was born in Omaha, Nebraska and holds a master’s degree in journalism and mass communication (1968) and bachelor’s degree in radio and television (1963), both from Iowa State University.

After leaving Iowa State, Greenlee formed Fultz, LaCasse & Greenlee, a full-service advertising and public relations agency in Des Moines.

Bob and his wife Diane purchased KADE, an AM radio station in Boulder, Colo. in 1975. In 1977, they bought a nearly bankrupt FM station there, built it into a top-rated station, and sold them both two years later.

Greenlee and Frank Day, a Colorado restaurateur, began operating the Walnut Brewery in Boulder in 1990, which became the Rock Bottom, ChopHouse, and Old Chicago chain of restaurants, now with over 90 restaurants nationwide. Greenlee remains on the company’s board of directors.

Greenlee operated a Colorado development company and continued to invest in radio stations in the Denver, Colo., Tucson, Ariz., Omaha, Neb., and Vail, Colo. markets through the 1990s. He is currently president of Centennial Investment & Management Company, Inc., a Boulder-based real estate and venture capital investment firm.

Greenlee was appointed to Boulder’s city council in 1982 and was elected to three terms. He was elected to serve as the mayor of Boulder in 1997 and ran unsuccessfully for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives a year later.

The Greenlees have been involved in a number of charitable and civic organizations over the years. They organized and funded the “I Have a Dream Foundation” in 1990 to provide educational opportunities to low income and minority students, and the Greenlee Family Foundation in 1996 to fund other civil and community charitable organizations throughout Colorado.

In 1997, the Greenlees provided Iowa State with a $9 million challenge gift to initiate the university’s first named school, the Greenlee School of Journalism and Mass Communication.