Award brings Ann Curry home to father's upbringing in Pueblo

Former NBC Network news anchor and international correspondent Ann Curry heard a lot of kind words said about her on Saturday night in Denver. But the voice she heard whispering in her ear was that of her Colorado-born father, saying: “Nice going there, Little Britches.”

Curry was presented the Damon Runyon Award from the Denver Press Club at its 28th annual banquet at the Curtis Hotel on April 27.

“You are living in a part of America dad loved best,” she said upon accepting the award from 9News anchor Kyle Clark.

“He would say to me, ‘Anna, do you know that Colorado means ‘colored red’ in Spanish?’ And, ‘Oh, how you should see the mountains glow,’” said Curry.

Curry, 67, was born in Guam, the daughter of Hiroe Nagase and Bob Curry, who was of Irish and German ancestry. He was born and raised in Pueblo. The namesake of her latest award, Damon Runyon, was raised in Pueblo as well.

Curry visited Pueblo the day before the ceremony, along with a genealogist, and discovered, she said, how her father’s upbringing influenced her own worldview.

“I learned that Pueblo was a major railroad town and a unique place to grow up, because, back in the 1800s, the barons brought in immigrants from all over the world – from Europe, Latin America and Egypt – to work in the coal mines and steel mills that fueled the industrialization of the American West,” she said. 

“It makes you wonder: Did that tremendous racial and ethnic mix influence the sense of worldliness and yet rootedness that we see in Runyon’s writing, and that I can recognize in my father's character, and also in his life in the military?

“I also learned that dad grew up on the poor east side of Pueblo without a telephone, much less a radio or a television set, which helps explain why he later subscribed to more than one newspaper. He loved reading newspapers – though, watching the news? Not so much,” she added with a laugh.

“Now, he did love himself some Walter Cronkite, and he did cheer when I became a news woman. Even if it is on what he would sometimes call ‘the boob tube.’” 

Curry has reported from conflicts in Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Darfur, Congo, the Central African Republic, Kosovo, Serbia, Lebanon and Israel; on nuclear tensions from North Korea and Iran; and on numerous humanitarian disasters including the tsunamis in Southeast Asia and Japan, and the massive 2010 earthquake in Haiti, where her appeal via Twitter is credited for helping to speed the arrival of humanitarian planes.

“Ann Curry is a legendary journalist who cut a trailblazing path from her first TV job in Medford, Ore., onto the national stage,” said Kevin Vaughan, a veteran investigative reporter for 9News and former president of the Denver Press Club. “Her groundbreaking work reporting around the globe bringing unique and needed stories to us has truly defined a professional life lived in the mold of Damon Runyon.”

Curry spoke directly to the prevailing dangers of misinformation entering the latest presidential election cycle and championed journalism as a basic and universal human right.

“I have come to think that access to verifiable, unvarnished facts is critical to all people no matter what kind of government they live under,” said Curry, who encouraged her fellow journalists to continue to seek and tell the truth, fight for important stories and protect the American public from fake news.

Curry also noted her respect for former winners of the Runyon Award, specifically late NBC colleague Tim Russert. Other past winners have included Mike Royko, Molly Ivins, Tom Brokaw, Bob Costas, Judy Woodruff and Eugene Robinson. 

“Ann Curry's speech on the value of journalism in our rapidly evolving landscape was inspiring,  and a welcome reminder of the importance of a free press,” said Marianne Goodland, Colorado Politics reporter and current president of the Denver Press Club. ”We are grateful for her visit to Denver and for accepting the Runyon Award.”

The Damon Runyon Award has been presented annually by the Denver Press Club, the nation's oldest continuously operating press club, each spring since 1994, except for 2021 and 1997.

The award is named after Damon Runyon, a legendary journalist who grew up in Colorado, worked at The Denver Post and Pueblo Chieftain, and became a member of the Press Club in 1907. Proceeds go toward the club’s historic preservation and five scholarships for $1,500 and one — the John C. Ensslin Memorial Scholarship — for $3,000. The scholarships are reserved for college journalists from universities in Colorado.