ARKANSAS CITY — Robert Moore flew Army planes in Vietnam, dresses like a cowboy, created his own backyard honky-tonk, and once swam across the Mississippi River just to say he had done it.
But he has a softer side.
He gave up football in college because he didn’t like to hit people and wants to open a bed-and-breakfast when he retires.
His eyes fill with tears when talking about two people close to him who died four decades ago - one hisbest friend, the other his father.
Moore’s past helped shape the man now on the verge of becoming the speaker of the Arkansas House of Representatives, which goes into session Jan. 10.
“I have a lot of moments of good and bad in life when I can feel the ghost of my father, sometimes sitting in judgment, shaking his head, saying, ‘Son. Son,’” Moore said. “But most of the time the last few years I kind of feel like he might be saying, ‘You did OK.’”
Legislative colleagues describe Moore as a steady hand who will provide much-needed institutional knowledge of government in a term-limited Legislature.
Moore, 66, a Democrat from Arkansas City, has served in diverse capacities in state government, including being director of the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board for 20 years.
“Every time I deal with Robert, whether we agreed or disagreed, he was always very direct and always kept his word,” said Rep. Kathy Webb, D-Little Rock, a top adviser to Moore. “And he expects people to keep their word to him. If anybody underestimates Robert’s talents because he looks a little laidback, they are mistaken.”
Robert Smith Moore Jr. was born Jan. 1, 1945, to Robert S. and Dorothy Moore.His father was the Desha County sheriff for more than two decades; his mother, a local leader in Democratic politics, later became Gov. Bill Clinton’s receptionist; and Moore’s grandfather, I.N. Moore, was a state legislator.
Moore went to Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia on a football scholarship, but with only 145 pounds on his 6-foot-2 frame, he switched to basketball.
While there, he joined the advanced ROTC program and was commissioned as a second lieutenant.
Moore and his best friend from college, Pryor Wheat of Helena, wanted to avoid the jungles of Vietnam, so they went to flight school. Each requested assignment to the airborne division. Moore’s request was granted. Wheat’s wasn’t.
“He went to Vietnam and was over there about three months and got killed,”Moore said.
“As you look back on life, I’ve been to his grave many times. I shed a tear every time. It’s just like that fickle hand of fate. Why did I ...”
His voice trails off and he says nothing for about 10 seconds.
“Why did I get to draw the ...”
He paused briefly again.
“... the good cards that led me here all these years? I could have just as easily been the one [who died]. There wasn’t any reason I got whatI wanted and Pryor didn’t. It cost him his life. He got cut short pretty much for nothing. Just like the other 55,000 people who died over there.”
Moore served a year in Vietnam from the summer of 1968 to the summer of 1969, flying observation planes, reporting what he saw. Sometimes what he saw was useful. But other times he would see people working rice fields and had no idea whether they were friend or foe.
“I went to Vietnam pretty much a traditional Southern conservative and came back with a lot of different ideas,” he said. “I liked the concept of peace a lot more than the concept of war. It led me to always have a healthy degree of skepticism about government. Government shouldalways be held accountable.”
Afterward, he taught ROTC at Henderson State University in Arkadelphia. He began to wear his hair longer and was scolded by his superior officers.
He left the Army in 1971after five years.
“I didn’t want someone to tell me to get my hair cut and my shoes shined,” he said.
He went to law school at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, let his hair get long, grew a full beard.
Moore butted heads with his father, the sheriff.
“He always used to say, ‘This is my boy. He’s a good boy - underneath that hair and beard,’” Moore said.
That would gnaw.
“We had a talk one time,” Moore recalled. “I came to him, son to father, on some topic. He gave me some fatherly wisdom and said, ‘Well, if you get your hair cut and shave that beard, things would straighten out for you.’ I bowed up to him and he bowed up to me.”
About a month after that, the sheriff called his son, told him he had a meeting in Little Rock and asked him to be there.
“He introduced me to his friends and never said [anything about the hair],” Moore said, pausing, his eyes filling with tears. “He just said, ‘This is my son.’”
Moore left the meeting happy. It seemed like he was finally going to develop a friendship with his father.
Later that day in 1973, Moore heard his father had been in a car accident south of Pine Bluff while driving back to Arkansas City.
His father died two days later.
Moore then finished his last months of law school at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock to be nearer his mother (she died in 2008.)
He had a variety of jobs after that: assistant attorney general under Jim Guy Tucker, an administrative law judge with the Workers’ Compensation Commission, an aide to Clinton in the governor’s office, chairman of a now-defunct board that regulated trucking, and a private-practice attorney and real estate manager, among other things.
Clinton, a Democrat, appointed him as head of Alcoholic Beverage Control in 1987. He kept his job under two other governors, Tucker, a Democrat, and Mike Huckabee, a Republican.
“Robert is someone who always works for consensus,” said Ron Fuller, a former Republican legislator and Alcoholic Beverage Control board member. “He has a real good ability for understanding people and their needs and getting people to work together.”
While at Alcoholic Beverage Control, Moore helped set up regulations for bedand-breakfast wine sales, outdoor service of alcohol at restaurants, and the expansion of private clubs.
In 2006 he was unopposed in his race for House District 12. He was re-elected in 2008 and 2010 without opposition. In March 2010, colleagues chose him as speaker over Rep. Johnnie Roebuck, DArkadelphia.
He views his coming term as speaker as a way to honor his “great family legacy” of public service.
He thinks about his father each drive between Arkansas City and Little Rock, passing the spot on U.S. 65 where the accident happened.
During his time in the Legislature, he got legislation passed to allow a tax credit for refurbishing historic homes and to use $1 million a year from the Game and Fish Commission natural gas lease revenue for nature trails.
His main focus is what he calls “geotourism.” He has a dream of linking nature trails, scenic drives, nature preserves and wetlands to attract investors and tourists and prop up the Delta economy. He’s not sure exactly what type of legislation, if any, he might push to meet that goal.
He regrets that his hometown is dying, like so many other towns in the area. He loves Arkansas City, which is just across a levee from the Mississippi River. He has many fond memories, such as being 14 and swimming across the river.
He looks longingly at a map of the area with the proposed “Great River Bridge” nearby as part of the proposed Interstate 69 project.
“Eventually, it will come,” he said.
He lives with his wife of 23 years, the former Beverly Bailey, on a farm that has been in his family since the 1920s.
They met at a Little Rock bank where she worked. He has two sons in Little Rock from a previous marriage: Rob, 43, a musician, and Lee, 40, who works for the Nature Conservancy. Moore has three grandchildren.
Out behind the house is an old train depot Moore and his wife furnished with booths, beer signs, and a shuffleboard game from Peck’s, a Little Rock drinking spot that closed in the late 1980s. The place was special to the couple, so when it closed they bought nearly everything that was inside it.
“Outside Peck’s was the first time I told Beverly I loved her,” Moore said.
He calls the old train depot “Peck’s Southeast.”
There is a small kitchen behind the bar, a jukebox and a beer cooler.
“Danger Men Drinking,” one sign reads.
He’s held many a political gathering at Peck’s Southeast, including for Gov. Mike Beebe, US. Rep. Mike Ross, and Huckabee. Photographs on the wall show Moore with politicians and also with musicians, including Bob Dylan and Merle Haggard.
Moore views Dylan as one of the wiser philosophers around and once got to present the keys to the city of Little Rock to Dylan before a concert.
In most of the photos, Moore has a mustache. He said he shaved it off shortly after entering the Legislature because he had a “martini buzz” and was bothered that the gray hairs grew longer than the black ones.
“We all operate at our best when we enjoy life, at least I do,” Moore said.
Front Section, Pages 1 on 01/02/2011