In the summer of 2002, Shirley executive produced, produced, and edited the  one-hour television pilot COWBOY, as well as floor directing the live audience stage show, and was the camera operator/sound mixer on several second unit sequences. Writing, producing, directing, and editing a series of business videos, Shirley Bendell  won the very rare and coveted First Place Gold Peak Award for a business and marketing training video she produced. The prestigious award was presented by the International Television Alliance (ITVA) at the 1998 Denver Video Festival. Graduating with honors with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Mass Communication, with Emphasis on Film and Television, from the University of Southern Colorado, Shirley is very accomplished editing video with Media 100, Avid Composer, and Avid Xpress editing systems; as well as experienced in all aspects of feature film, acting, writing, directing, producing, editing, stunts, shooting video, sound editing, and conforming film. Shirley has been a national finalist for her videos in the Telly Awards and the Horizon Awards. She has also been an associate producer and videographer on multi-camera mix live sports events shooting for the Denver Nuggets basketball games, Colorado State Fair PRCA Rodeo, and numerous high school football and baseball games. She has produced videos as diverse as a marketing and training video for CPA’s, to a documentary on a YWCA Domestic Violence Women’s Shelter, and then to a video documentary on bighorn sheep, or even a series of award-winning training modules to be used by Small Business Centers in Community Colleges on Entrepreneurial Studies.  She was also a major supporting actress and stuntwoman in the successful low budget action/adventure feature film, THE INSTRUCTOR (Shapiro Entertainment Corp/Vestron Video, 1984), and has also acted in professional theater. In 2002, Shirley also wrote, produced, and directed a twenty-minute video on events in the life of Jesus of Nazareth, and in early 2003, was a production assistant on the one-hour television show TILLY for PAX cable network and produced by IMS Productions. Shirley currently, along with Don, is a graduate student at Grand Canyon University in Phoenix at The Ken Blanchard School of Business working on her Master of Science degree in Leadership.

Master Shirley Bendell

 
An action-oriented person, Ms. Bendell is a fifth degree black belt master with over 28 years experience in Tae Kwon Do, Freestyle Karate, Judo, and Jujitsu.  She created an innovative Mini-Ninja program for 3, 4, and 5 year-olds, which was copied by most karate schools in southern Colorado. She also started a transitional program for 5 year olds called Power Ninjas. Shirley is Chief Instructor of Bendell Karate in Canon City and Pueblo West.

With a smile a mile-wide, the former Student Senate President at Pueblo Community College and long-time martial arts instructor, Shirley’s real specialties are handling and leading people, writing, directing, producing, acting, editing,  and outworking anyone she works with. An overachiever and consummate perfectionist, she is one of those rare people that everyone knows that they can count on to start and finish any project she undertakes. Shirley is also very accomplished at breaking and training horses.

Shirley has has had four surgeries on her right leg and foot from just one incident of a horse falling on her and crushing her leg. She also had a 1,300 pound quarter-horse flip itself on her high in the mountains in the late-eighties, then it fell back on her 3 times trying to stand, and finally stepped all over her while she lay unconscious. The following day, in intensive care in the hospital, she had a horseshoe-shaped bruise on the side of her neck and three more on her spine. When she competed in karate tournaments, Shirley not only only won first place every time she competed, she never even had one point scored against her by another woman in sparring. In one tournament in Las Vegas, she literally ripped the uniform top off two separate competitors running them out of the ring with kicks and punches.

 Like Don, Shirley has been a long-time recovering alcoholic and has been public about being a former victim of both gang rape and acquaintance rape. In 1996, she won the very prestigious Jefferson Award for southern Colorado from KOAA NBC-TV and the Pueblo Chieftain, for her work with rape victims, alcoholics, drug addicts, and her outstanding Sexual Assault Prevention Program for women. She also started an ARC program, All Recovery in Christ, a part of Overcomers Outreach in Canon City, Colorado. ARC is a 12-step program for all who are affected in any way by obsessive behavior such as alcoholism utilizing the 12-steps of Alcoholic Anonymous but with Jesus Christ as the recognized "Higher Power." 

Also like Don, Shirley was born in northeastern Ohio, graduating from Youngstown Boardman High School but then lived the early part of her adult life in Akron, Ohio. As a young girl, Shirley took ballet, tap, toe-tap, jazz, and gymnastics, and she used to give acrobatic exhibitions until breaking her tailbone. She loves to camp, fish, and bowhunt on horseback in the Rocky Mountains, work with horses, play tennis or golf, and go dancing with Don. She has three sons, one step-son, two step-daughters, and seven grandchildren. Shirley and Don have been married since September 6, 1981. Shirley sometimes proudly wears specially-made T-shirts with a Green Beret with slanted dagger behind it, and the words over and under it reading: "Wife and Mother of Green Berets . . .an Incredible Breed of Woman." That pretty much describes Shirley Bendell best.