LITTLE ROCK — Fulfilling a lifelong dream, Ronald Harlow Bullerwell spent eight years visiting 48 of the 50 states in his recreational vehicle after serving as a police officer for 31 years.
In 2008, he and his wife, Sheila Bullerwell, began managing an RV park in North Little Rock.
Ron Bullerwell died Monday of heart failure at Baptist Health Medical Center in North Little Rock.
He was 64.
Born March 15, 1946, in Somerville, Mass., to Howard and Charlotte Bullerwell, he was the second youngest of five children.
He graduated in 1965 from Medford High School in Massachusetts and joined the U.S. Air Force during the Vietnam War as an Air Police officer. Stationed in Guam, Bullerwell patrolled buildings, guarded planes and trained police dogs, his wife said.
In 1967, he married his first wife, Nancy Bryant. They had two children and divorced in 1989.
Ron Bullerwell was honorably discharged in 1969 and began working as a police officer in Rye, N.H.
In 1973, he started a 27-year career at the Little Rock Police Department as a narcotics-unit detective, bailiff and patrolman with the motorcycle division, his son Mike Bullerwell said. Ron Bullerwell trained police dogs in the mid-1970s, his son said.
“While he was training a narcotics dog, he would hide all kinds of dope around the house, until I got a little older and mom told him to get that crap out of there,” Mike Bullerwell said.
In the late 1970s, Ron Bullerwell received an associate’s degree from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.
Bullerwell met his future wife, Sheila Marsh, at the Arkansas State Fair. They married in 1989, and he became a stepfather to her two children, she said.
After he was diagnosed with a heart condition in February 2000, Ron and Sheila Bullerwell both retired.
Having owned a recreational vehicle for several years, they became fulltime travelers, selling their home and touring the United States for eight years. Sheila Bullerwell said they made a trip to Nova Scotia, Canada, to see his grandfather’s grave. Her husband loved to cook and fish, even catching a shark in Florida, their favorite destination.
Sheila Bullerwell said they made countless friends with fellow RV travelers.
“When we’d go into campgrounds and people were having trouble with their RV, Ron was always willing to help people and fix things,” she said.
In 2008, the couple decided to manage the Downtown Riverside RV Park at 50 Riverfront Drive in North Little Rock.
According to its website, northlittlerockriversidervpark.com, it can hold 72 RVs along the Arkansas River.
Bob Major, special events director for the North Little Rock Chamber of Commerce, said the park has seen more than 2,000 RVs this year.
Major said the Bullerwells “have just gone over and above the call of duty to make every visitor feel like their friend and someone who would enjoy repeat visits to the park.”
One example, he said, was when a visiting couple told Ron and Sheila Bullerwell it was their 35th wedding anniversary.
“They called the Little Rock [Convention and] Visitors Bureau and got a special gift basket for them,” Major said. “It’s just those extra special things they do.”
Major said Ron Bullerwell was in charge of park maintenance, but was also the resident RV expert.
“[New RV owners] could come to the park and he’d teach them how to back up, how to park. [Ron and Sheila Bullerwell] would visit with the people and share with them the tricks of the trade for being an RVer and all the things you need to know while traveling the country,” Major said. “Many people ended up getting a lot of lessons from Ron and Sheila.”
Arkansas, Pages 12 on 09/23/2010