King's long community career lauded

Valley Bank co-founder honored as Great Chief

By NANCY KIMBALL / Daily Inter Lake

Community means a lot to Jack King.

As co-founder of Valley Bank nearly a half-century ago, his vision was to feed back into the community. He helped form the Montana Independent Bankers Association and later was president of Independent Bankers Association of America, again emphasizing community strength.

The former University of Montana Grizzly football player has had a hand in Flathead Valley high school sports, his Presbyterian Church, the Museum at Central School, local Rotary and much more.

On Thursday night, the Kalispell Chamber of Commerce let King know he means a lot to the community by naming him this year's Great Chief.

It's the Chamber's oldest and most prestigious award, given at the annual Chamber banquet to honor civic and volunteer spirit that spans a lifetime and provides a legacy for the community.

To commemorate the honor, King - a big Montana Grizzlies fan - received a Bob Scriver bronze of a grizzly sow and her two cubs, titled "Three Bears."

At least one outside observer agrees that Jack King fills the bill for Great Chief.

Larry Gianchetta, dean of the University of Montana Business School, called King's commitment to represent the Flathead at the university "incredible." It helped earn King a nomination as an outstanding alumnus of the business school.

But the dean also is impressed with King on his home ground.

"Each time I travel to the Flathead area I make it a point to spend some time with Jack King," Gianchetta wrote in his letter supporting King's award.

"The number of people who come together at Jack's request is another testimony of how highly regarded he is as a civic leader," he continued. When King introduces Gianchetta as a guest speaker at Rotary meetings, "the mere fact that he is the person introducing me lends a tremendous advantage when speaking to the group."

King's history is closely tied to the Flathead's.

Shortly before graduating from UM, he married his high school sweetheart who still is a prime part of his life 58 years later. He and Almeda had three children - Karen, whose husband, Ron Rosenberg, is Valley Bank president, and John and A.J., president and executive vice president, respectively, of Three Rivers Bank.

Jack King first went to work for Commercial Credit Corporation in Missoula, then to First Bank System's Metals Bank and Trust Co. in Butte. A job offer from Conrad National Bank brought him back to his hometown of Kalispell in 1955. Those owners appointed him manager of their Bank of Columbia Falls, where he stayed until 1962 when he and a friend bought the controlling interest in the State Bank of Somers.

They got approval to move its charter to Kalispell and change the name to Valley Bank. It grew from $1.8 million in assets to more than $100 million today.

He chartered a second Kalispell bank in 1974. First Security Bank of Kalispell now is known as Three Rivers Bank of Montana and has $100 million in assets.

Gov. Tom Judge appointed King to the first Montana State Banking Board, and Gov. Tim Babcock appointed him to a second term. In the late 1960s King helped organize the Montana Independent Bankers Association and later served as its president.

He served two terms on the UM School of Business advisory council and later was on the University Foundation Board.

In 1984 he rose to president of the Independent Bankers Association of America when the trade association was at an all-time high membership of 7,800 independent community banks. As an officer he arranged Visa/MasterCard capabilities for community banks nationwide, and later was first chairman of the board governing the bank-card service.

In that role, he was among a group that met with President Ronald Reagan on the farm crisis. He also testified on community banking before Ralph Nader's blue-ribbon commission in Washington, D.C., the U.S. Senate Banking Committee, a subcommittee of the House Business and Industry Committee, and Montana Sen. Lee Metcalf's special committee on the farm crisis.

Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volker appointed King in 1988 to the system's consumer advisory council, and Chairman Alan Greenspan appointed him to a second term.

King also is or has been Columbia Falls Chamber of Commerce president, Kalispell Chamber board member, a director for the Montana Logging Association Service Corporation, committee member to start the Northwest Montana Historical Society and its museum, Kalispell Regional Medical Center Foundation chairman, Kalispell Chamber committee member to support tourism, part of a joint effort among local bankers that resulted in cleaning up the railroad corridor through Kalispell, and a member of Rotary and the First Presbyterian Church of Kalispell.