Beth Bowlen Wallace shares her favorite Broncos moment

Editor’s note: This is the final story from an MHR exclusive interview in December with Beth Bowlen Wallace. Here is the Part 1 and Part 2. The photo used for the story is not the one Bowlen Wallace told us about Super Bowl XXXII.

Beth Bowlen Wallace has a time machine.

And what a time machine it is.

The second-oldest daughter of Denver Broncos owner Pat Bowlen can buckle up and traverse back to a moment in her life she may wish she could stay in forever. When time seemed to stop for her, but also her father.

That time machine is a selfie — just not in the iteration we’ve come to know it. It came courtesy of a Polaroid that captured a special moment between her and her father.

For the final story in our series, we asked Bowen Wallace, what is your favorite Broncos moment? It is a story better left told by Bowlen Wallace herself.

“I have had many, very meaningful moments over the 35-plus years my dad has owned the Broncos,” she said. “My favorite was Super Bowl 32. During that season, my father took me on the road with the team for the playoff run. We were a wild card team, so we had to win on the road to make it to the big stage, which we did. And thank God we won our first Super Bowl!

“After the victory party, I was on my way back to my hotel room when I noticed that my dad’s lights were still on in his suite. I knocked on the door and he let me in. He was getting ready to retire for the night. I saw a big ‘James Bond’ looking trunk in the foyer.

“I said, ‘Is that it?’

“He says, ‘Yes.’

“I said, ‘Can we open it up?’

“He said, ‘Sure!’

“It took a few minutes to figure out how to get the trunk open, but we did, and there sat the Lombardi Trophy. We hoisted it and looked at each other just laughing with unabated joy. We took selfies with my disposable camera. I still have those photos. When I laid down to go to sleep that night, I imagined my dad putting the trophy on the dresser at the end of his bed so when he woke up the next morning it was the first thing he saw, and he knew it wasn’t just a dream.”

Those of us Broncos fans who were old enough to experience that Super Bowl in January of 1998 in San Diego may have time machines of our own that take us back to that exhilarating moment. For me, I’m in the living room of the home I grew up in Greeley, with my mom. When it became clear Denver was going to beat the Green Bay Packers, I looked at my mom who had tears of disbelief in her eyes. She was thinking about her father, who died nearly 20 years earlier, wishing he could experience it with us.

We might not be as fortunate as Bowlen Wallace to have selfie photos with the owner who made it possible, but we took snapshots in our mind that make us smile to this day.

Now Broncos Country can also picture that moment of pure bliss in Mr. B’s suite with a Polaroid camera and the Lombardi Trophy hoisted overhead. My hope is that the Bowlen family gets a knock on their hotel room door today for the news Mr. B has been inducted in Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll take a trip in my own time machine.