LITTLE ROCK — Huie Bird’s life was a testament to the idea that if you work hard, your dreams can come true, his daughter Peggy Cogan said.
After working as a dragline operator - operating a power-driven crane to excavate or move materials such as mud or gravel - for 28 years, he launched 12 franchised hotels around Arkansas with his wife - all without a college education.
Huie Bird died Saturday in his Clarksville home from long-term heart complications. He was 75.
Bird was born Feb. 25, 1935 in Birdtown, a small community in Conway County, to Rosa Gordon Bird and Samuel Porter Bird. The youngest of 10 children, he enjoyed playing basketball as a child, Cogan said. He graduated from high school in Center Ridge in 1953.
At 18, he became a dragline operator at a small Oklahoma coal company soon after moving to Garland Coal & Mining company, his wife, Doris Bird, said. During his 28-year career, he worked in several different states including New York, Maine and Oklahoma, where he met his wife. The couple met in 1952 and married Feb. 10, 1956. They had two daughters.
In 1969, he moved to Johnson County, to work for another coal company. Bird then decided to purchase Hartman Grocery Store in 1969 in Hartman.
“His father had been in the grocery business most of his life. He wanted to do something that would follow in his dad’s footsteps,” his wife said.
Doris Bird said the two ran the store while Bird kept working for the coal company. Wanting to give youths living in Hartman somewhere to socialize, his wife said they opened Bird’s Drive-In Restaurant & Recreation in 1973. Doris Bird said her husband loved being around the young crowd.
“He enjoyed playing games with the young teenagers and challenging them,” his wife said. “If these kids decided they wanted a burger or whatever and they had no money, he would come up and tell me to fix them that anyway.”
Keeping that spirit of hospitality, the couple decided to sell the store and restaurant in 1978 and open The Caprice Motor Inn in Clarksville. He retired from dragline work in 1980 to focus full-time on a career in the hotel business. The hotel started with 21 units, a restaurant and service station, Doris Bird said.
Over 32 years, the couple opened 12 different franchised hotels around Arkansas and three in Branson, his daughter said.
Doris Bird said her husband liked the business side of owning hotels the most.
“He enjoyed developing properties. He liked negotiating and he liked to see them built. ... He would really think about the locations,” Doris Bird said.
Huie and Doris Bird won several awards for their work in the hotel business, including a score of 1,000 - the highest hotel ranking from the chain for cleanliness and customer satisfaction - for their Best Western in Bentonville.
Although the hotels kept him busy, Cogan said her father rarely missed an Arkansas Razorback ball game on television.
Bird experienced several medical problems throughout his life including heart disease, lung cancer and a large abdominal aortic aneurysm in his stomach, his daughter said. However, he kept an optimistic view and always encouraged others to strive for excellence, Cogan said.
“Higher education was something he really stressed in our lives because that’s something he wasn’t able to do. He’s self-made,” Cogan said.
Arkansas, Pages 10 on 06/22/2010