H. Gary Blankenship

H. Gary Blankenship has been chairman and CEO of Greater Southwest Bancshares, Inc., and Bank of the West since chartering the bank in 1986. Blankenship continues to be active in the bank, particularly in strategic planning and M & A activities.

He was previously employed as president and CEO of two other banks and served several years in the corporate structure of large Texas banking organizations as an officer and director. Prior to his public banking career, he served as an officer and manager of two finance companies located in West Texas. He then served for eight years with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency as a national bank examiner based in Denver where he performed bank examinations in the United States and abroad. He has served on the Texas Department of Banking Commissioner’s Council, as a trustee on the Independent Bankers Association of Texas Insurance Bond Trust, and as a director of National Bancshares of Texas, Inc. He previously served on the board and as vice chairman of Adfitech, a mortgage technology and consulting company. Blankenship served as past chairman of the board and currently serves as a director of TIB, a $2.9 billion asset bank that serves as a national community correspondent bankers’ bank.

Blankenship was the recipient of the prestigious Chairman’s Award for the Independent Bankers

Association of Texas. In 2013, he and his wife, Cynthia Blankenship, who is also a banker and co-founder of the bank, were named recipients of the prestigious D. E. Box Citizens of the Year Award in Grapevine, Texas. He was named in the top 500 Most Powerful Business Leaders in Dallas-Fort Worth in 2016 and 2017.

Blankenship graduated from West Texas State University, now known as West Texas A&M, with a BBA in Finance and Accounting and received his MBA from the University of Dallas in 1982.