There is a photo of Willard Simms, taken by The Denver Post’s George Crouter, in Simms’ 1980 book “Ten Days Every January.” Simms, who was the general manager of the National Western Stock Show from 1955 to 1978, leans against the original wooden plank pens of the Denver Union Stock Yard Company in a short-brimmed hat, a neckerchief and a Town and Country-style wool coat with fur on the lapels. Behind him is a pen of bedded and burly Herefords and the Livestock Exchange Building. It is the quintessential snapshot of when cattle were king and he is the personification of the 1950-something industry.

The Yards, the portion of the NWSS that originally housed the Denver Union Stockyard Company, was long home to the carload show. The name, itself, is reminiscent of the days when carloads of fat cattle arrived in Denver with drovers aboard to care for them until they were sold. Commission men worked for F. E. Smith Livestock Brokers, Clay Robinson and Company, and the A. A. Blakley Commission Company, among others. They sold cattle for the ranches to livestock buyers who primarily represented the packers that surrounded the Stockyards. Once purchased, the cattle were pushed by hands on horseback across bridges that crossed what is now National Western Drive, and directly to the packers.

Among the most notable of the heyday Denver packers were the seven-story Swift & Company plant and the nine-story Armour plant. The Cudahy Packing Company (with an impressive electric sign that buzzed above a parking lot filled with 1930s model cars), locally owned Fryer Stillman, Pepper Packing Co., Western Packing Company, Colorado Packing & Provision Company and others were all bustling while the Omaha and Grant Smelter towered in the background.

Denver was also a hub for hogs and sheep, especially once tunnels connected the Western Slope sheep and cattlemen to the mile high market. Eventually, trucking became commonplace and regional markets sprung up in rural communities and the Denver Union Stock Yard Company shuttered in 1978. Large feedyards also took the place of many a farmer-feeder. The packing industry, too, changed to include small to mid-sized packers and eventually the giants like Brazilian-owned JBS, which purchased Swift & Company in 2007.

The Denver Union Stockyards Company was owned by railroad companies in Chicago, as were most of the stockyards around the country. The market was served by the Denver & Rio Grande, Union Pacific and Burlington Railways and empty 36-foot stock cars would be loaded in the towns near ranches and brought to market. The rail companies weren’t as interested in being in the cattle business as they were interested in controlling the shipping business, which they did.

On any given day in the Livestock Exchange Building, a character in a green shade visor with sleeves rolled up like a casino dealer would print the market reports on a large chalkboard. Men like H.E. Green, who ran the Record Stockman for decades, would ride the rail, get the report and take it back to Greeley to air on the radio. Years later, Evan Slack, arguably Colorado’s most influential farm broadcaster, also broadcast his reports from an office in the building. The national headquarters of the American National Livestock Association came to town as well as a field office of the Packers and Stockyards Administration. Anyone who was anyone was there.

There’s no doubt there have been changes to the Yards and Denver’s “Cow Town” designation. Nonetheless, if you leave the throngs of people and move beyond the llamas and make your way to The Yards in the next few weeks, you’ll see glimpses of industry history. There will be crews with carloads of bulls representing ranch operations that have made their way to the NWSS for decades. There will be cattlemen from all across this country and others making deals that will keep them moving forward. There will be bulls and semen and heifers and embryos sold. There is no shortage of stories to be told in The Yards, either. If you find a pen of cattle with a crew keeping them looking and feeling good, look for the ranch sign. Ask the guy who looks like he pays the bill at dinner to tell you about the operation. He’ll be glad to.

The Yards are filled with the best of the “reputation” herds, ranches that market hundreds of cattle annually, and stand behind each one sold. They make their way to Denver not on a train but in deep-breathing pickups and aluminum stock trailers to display their cattle and show producers where they can purchase more like them. They bring their crews and cattle and spend thousands each day for the opportunity.

There are millions of dollars of deals made in The Yards in Denver, anyone who is anyone will be there, and that part hasn’t changed.

Rachel Gabel writes about agriculture and rural issues. She is assistant editor of The Fence Post Magazine, the region’s preeminent agriculture publication. Gabel is a daughter of the state’s oil and gas industry and a member of one of the state’s 12,000 cattle-raising families, and she has authored children’s books used in hundreds of classrooms to teach students about agriculture.