Clyde William Neu

Clyde William Neu died Saturday, April 29 at his home in Missoula surrounded by family after a long battle with Parkinson’s Disease. He was 77. Clyde was born on June 5, 1945, in Butte, Montana, to Joseph Clyde Neu and Doris Mooney Neu. Two years later, joined by their second son, James, the family moved to his father’s home town of Philipsburg where Clyde, Sr. opened a clothing store (as his own father had done a half century earlier) and a third son, David, was born. Blessed with a small town raising, Clyde worked summers on a local ranch and at his grandfather’s farm in Conrad, sold “Grit”, a weekly newspaper, and graduated in 1963 as salutatorian from Granite County High School. He received his Bachelor of Sciences Degree in Math and Economics in 1967 and a Masters in Agricultural Economics the following year from Montana State University where he was a member of Sigma Nu Fraternity. He joined the U. S Army Reserve upon graduating and inspired by an MSU business professor named Lloyd Rixe, who mentored him in a joint business venture, he enrolled at the University of Minnesota in January, 1970. He earned a PhD in Business Administration in the spring of 1973. Soon after, he returned to Montana where he began his career as Professor in the Business School of the University of Montana, teaching first at the University’s MBA program at Malmstrom Air Force base in Great Falls. In 1977, he took a hiatus from teaching and formed a consulting firm, Epic Management Group, which specialized in start-up businesses. In 1981, as a member of the Great Falls Ad Club, he served as Chairman of the 13th annual Charlie Russell Art Auction, spurring a lifelong interest in collecting Western Art. That fall, he was introduced to his future wife by a mutual friend in the Ad Club and in February, 1982, married Judi Joyner, the vibrant mother of three teenage sons. Theirs was a beautiful marriage from the start as Clyde helped raise the boys, Mark, Tim and Jim, and mentor them throughout the years. With Clyde’s love for entertaining and Judi’s love for cooking, many lasting friendships were forged during their time in “The Electric City”. In 1986, they moved to Billings where Clyde was hired as the director of the University of Montana’s newly established satellite MBA program. Shortly after the Soviet Union broke up in 1991,­ he traveled to Russia with several Billings businessmen to recruit Russian students to the US to pursue MBA degrees, articulately recording his observations in a journal as they passed through the towns and countryside by rail. With his three boys having graduated from the University of Montana, Clyde at last joined the Business faculty at the Missoula campus and eventually headed the MBA program. Forsaking his alma mater at MSU, he became an avid “Grizzly” regularly attending home football games at Washington Grizzly Stadium or basketball games at Dahlberg Arena, where Judy often joined him. Clyde took his professorship seriously, challenging his students at every level, demanding precision in their written essays, and always looking for the spark of entrepreneurship that might lead to success in the business world. He would actively seek out students in his undergraduate classes who showed interest, and as one colleague remembers it, convince the student to choose business as a major before they departed. A 2007 retirement party was held in his honor at Orchard Homes Country Life Cub in Missoula, where he was warmly toasted by several former students as well as faculty. Clyde’s enthusiasm in the classroom was equaled with friends and family, whether it was leading his younger cousins from Montana on an adventurous canoe trip into the “thousand lakes” of Minnesota while working on his PhD or years later, challenging his niece, Jessica in a race to the top of Pompey’s Pillar in Eastern Montana. Though he would work or recreate to the point of exhaustion, he was amazingly resilient, most evident in the aftermath of a 1985 fire that completely destroyed their home in Great Falls, after which he calmly counted their losses and moved on. His retirement years were filled with fishing trips, often to Alaska with his good friend and colleague in the Business School, Shawn Clouse, or hosted there by his childhood friend Gary Morrison, resulting in the successful catch of a 38-pound King Salmon in the Kenai River. In the footsteps of his father, an avid pheasant hunter, he joined his two brothers in hunts on the Mooney family farm near Conrad, and cherished their skiing trips to such notable destinations as Whistler, Sun Valley and Jackson Hole, where he accurately tallied his total vertical. Like his race to the top of Pompey’s pillar, Clyde put all his energy into what he chose to do, but it was the generous spirit of his heart, which he will be remembered by, never missing to send a birthday card to his family or advice to a student or friend. The short recollections he wrote in his final years at the urging of his sons about his hunting and fishing trips, his first automobiles (a ’57 Chevy, followed by a ’67 Pontiac GTO), and unabashedly taking on the persona of Myron Floren on the Lawrence Show while playing the accordion, are all about living life to the fullest and sharing it with others. He will be greatly missed by his family and all who knew him. Clyde’s loving wife, Judi, passed away in September, 2018. He is survived by his three stepsons, their wives, children and grandchildren: Mark Joyner and his daughters Hanna (Nate) Hackney; Lauren (Shaw) Robertson; Katelyn Vickers; Hope (Joe) Szklarski, and ten great-grandchildren; Tim and Jennifer Joyner, and their children Avery and Mark; and, Jim and Amy Joyner, and son Jackson. Clyde is also survived by his two younger brothers and their families: Jim (Catherine) and their children and grandchildren, son James and his sons Ethan and Liam; daughter Jessica (Sinan), and their son, Kurt; and David and his companion Rebecca. Numerous Uncles, aunts and cousins also grieve at Clyde’s passing. His final days were made easier by the compassionate care of Partners in Home Care Hospice and Harvest Homecare, to whom the family is very grateful. A Funeral Mass will be held Friday, May 5 at 1 p. m. at Blessed Trinity Catholic Community, 1475 Eaton St. Interment will take place at an undetermined time at the family plot in Philipsburg overlooking the Flint Creek Valley. Donations may be made to the Michael J Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research or a charity of one’s choice.