Cross & Crescent

Gary Morris (Indiana State 1975) and Curt Brighton (Indiana State 1976) are members of a tight-knit group that attended Indiana State University, located in Terre Haute, Indiana, in the 1970s. Morris went to Indiana State from a small Indiana town, and Brighton was a Terre Haute native.

Both say they initially looked into joining a fraternity to become more active on campus. They also both felt comfortable with the brothers in the Lambda Chi Alpha chapter house. The group of men quickly built a strong bond.

“We had a strong bond and camaraderie amongst this group. You looked forward to breaks between classes to come together,” says Morris. “It was a great adventure.”

“At the start of school each fall it wasn’t about me coming back to town, it was about everyone coming back to town because I hadn’t gone anywhere,” says Brighton.

Many of the brothers were first generation college students and many worked throughout school. To the group, it was a big deal to graduate and achieve career success.

Curt Brighton

Following college, Brighton attended law school at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. While in school he was asked, “what are you going to do when you get out?” His candid response was that he knew he wasn’t taking more than one bar exam.

“Low and behold….I am in my final semester and am not sure what I want to do and I end up taking two bar exams,” jokes Brighton.

He went to work for the firm he clerked with in Des Moines and he and his wife decided they were going to stay there.

“I found out I passed the Indiana Bar by someone calling me saying, ‘congratulations you passed the bar,’” says Brighton. “I was like, how do you know that? “It was in the Indianapolis Star.”

Being licensed in Indiana became beneficial as he was offered a job at a firm in Terre Haute. The firm had several senior partners and was a business practice, which interested Brighton.

A substantial part of the practice was working with Hulman & Company, and in 1994, Brighton was asked to become executive vice president and general counsel of the company.

In his position, Brighton holds the same executive vice president and general counsel title for all Hulman-George owned companies: Clabber Girl, Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Indy Racing League, and Wabash Valley Broadcasting.

When Brighton joined the company he had the expectation of working from his Terre Haute office but soon after came the start of the Brickyard 400 NASCAR race, and the inception of the IRL. Since then, IMS has also added a seven-year stint with Formula One racing and will host its first Moto-GT motorcycle race this fall. He says it is unusual to spend more than one day a week in Terre Haute.

“I get up in the morning thinking I am going to deal with one issue and not even get close to the neighborhood of the issue,” jokes Brighton. “I serve as a sounding board sometimes for people who don’t know how ideas will be taken at the upper levels of management, a mentor, and a hand holder; I am a jack of all trades.”

Brighton also worked at great length on the recent IRL-Champ Car merger. For many years he has dealt with the negotiation meetings and strategy with all involved parties.

“We have had a lot of good things happen to us in the last couple of months, and contrary to popular belief, the Indy 500 has been a stronger event than the Brickyard 400,” says Brighton. “I think time will ultimately tell that open wheel racing was never going to be successful unless it had a tight control structure. The sport is now positioned for tremendous growth.”

Gary Morris

Morris graduated from Indiana State and went to Ball State University to earn a master’s degree in urban planning. He soon realized he didn’t have the temperament for governmental work and decided to go into sales, and eventually food sales.

“I worked for Canteen Corp. managing operations and then moved back to Terre Haute about the same time Curt took his job there,” says Morris. “So we got to spend time together and with our families.”

Morris’ career then took him to Michigan, where he sold one business and started another one. He spent 12 years working outside of Indiana.

“Curt used to tell me that I would come to Indiana,” says Morris. “I came home one day and Curt had left a message saying that the individual that was running Clabber Girl was retiring and would I be interested in talking to them about the position.”

After meeting Tony George, the CEO of Hulman & Company, he was hired as vice president and general manager of Clabber Girl in November 1999. Following a restructuring, Morris was named chief operating officer and president.

Clabber Girl produces chemical leavener — the component that makes baked goods rise. Not only does the company manufacture retail brands but it also produces industrial brands for every major food processor in the country.

“We are fortunate to start off with a great brand that has been around since the 1870s, and the Hulman & Company was started in the 1850s,” says Morris. “Both Curt and I are part of a company that has been around for 158 years and is still privately held by the same family.”

Morris manages more than 200 employees. He has a national sales force, a growing amount of export business, and a manufacturing facility. Morris manages sales meetings, negotiates contracts with suppliers and with brands the company is interested in acquiring, and deals with the direction and structure of the company. He is also a member of several boards, including the Terre Haute Chamber of Commerce.

“My day-to-day operation goes between community activity and Clabber Girl,” says Morris. “The best part of my job is I get to dabble in all departments.”

Morris is able to compare his duties to those he had as an officer in the Fraternity.

“The responsibilities change, the expectations on the day-to-day basis are a little different, but the interactions and the politics in the Fraternity are similar,” says Morris. “It was a good social structure to learn in.”

Continuing Brotherhood

The two brothers feel that it’s been great being able to keep a close work and personal relationship.

“We have completely different roles but we understand you have to be part of a team to be successful in a business. Every person has a position to play that they need to attend to so everyone else can do their part.” says Brighton. “Hopefully, when the final buzzer has sounded you have won more games than you have lost.”

“Much like with Clabber Girl, I felt like I was part of something bigger than ourselves (in the Fraternity),” says Morris.

Morris says the Fraternity was like any other group where there is a certain population that does all the work. It was that group from the Fraternity that still stays in close contact today. The chapter alumni association has a big golf outing coming up in August. Every year at the ISU homecoming, Clabber Girl hosts a hospitality tent, and Lambda Chi hosts one next to it.

The two also find it interesting how the Indy 500 pulls the group together. When in college, the group got tickets to the race. Following graduation, they continued attending.

“I don’t sit in the bleachers anymore but that same group still comes back Memorial Day weekend,” says Morris, “I look back on the group and how it still keeps in touch, and the great relationships. What we thought was right at the time turns out to be right in the long term.”

“There has been a lot of continuing compatibility over time,” adds Brighton.