Invoice Schwyhart, a prominent businessman, investor and genuine estate developer who aided form the first progress of Rogers’ Pinnacle Hills interstate corridor, has died. He was 64.
According to his obituary, Schwyhart died Aug. 31 at his Dallas residence with his spouse Carolyn and son Alex by his aspect. The obituary included no induce of demise but a relatives spokesman explained to the Northwest Arkansas Small business Journal that Schwyhart died as a consequence of terminal cancer.
Visitation will be held at Cross Church Pinnacle Hills in Rogers on Tuesday (Sept. 7) at 12:45 p.m., followed by a funeral services at 2 p.m. U.S. Rep. Steve Womack, R-Rogers, the city’s mayor from 1999 to 2010, will provide the eulogy.
“I credit score Monthly bill Schwyhart for his vision and enthusiasm for the quick transformation of Rogers from a bedroom community to one particular of location character,” Womack claimed in a assertion. “The interactions he made within the retail and hospitality sector ended up significant to the city’s growth. There wasn’t a additional vocal promoter of the Pinnacle Hills eyesight than Monthly bill Schwyhart.”
Schwyhart built his name in Northwest Arkansas as an vehicle supplier just before turning his awareness to serious estate advancement. He grew up working in his father’s gas station in Stockton, Calif.
In accordance to a 2001 profile printed in the Northwest Arkansas Organization Journal, Schwyhart was 20 a long time aged when he loaded his 1967 Mercury Cougar with all his belongings in 1977 and moved from California to Springfield, Mo. He invested $10,000 he experienced saved to obtain a one-3rd curiosity in a Chrysler dealership in close by Marshfield. His father, Joe Schwyhart, was currently in the Ozarks, obtaining moved to Springfield when he retired.
In 1979, Schwyhart attended Chrysler supplier faculty in Detroit for six months. When there, he and a different pupil went to go to Lee Iacocca at his home — unannounced. Iacocca invited them inside and put in an hour talking with them. The future day, Iacocca went to the federal authorities to request a personal loan to rescue Chrysler from individual bankruptcy.
“I went back to Marshfield completely ready to slay the environment,” Schwyhart informed the Small business Journal in 2001. “But [the Chrysler dealership] just was not a viable operation, so we closed the small business.”
Schwyhart later moved to Rogers and purchased a Pontiac, Buick and GMC dealership. His father and Robert Thornton, a previous Walmart Inc. govt, came into the offer with him as companions. At the age of 23, Schwyhart was the youngest Buick seller in The united states. He utilised the very last section of his title for his new organization, inevitably incorporated as Hart Motor Co.
Schwyhart owned different automobile dealerships in Northwest Arkansas for the duration of the subsequent many yrs, together with substantial-conclusion designs BMW and Volkswagen.
By the mid-1990s, he started focusing on serious estate development. The booming automobile dealerships permitted Schwyhart to invest in Pinnacle Position, a land improvement that these days contains Cross Church Pinnacle Hills, Lewis & Clark Outfitters and several business structures. That grew to incorporate land holdings for the more prominent Pinnacle Hills, a retail, amusement and healthcare improvement along both sides of Interstate 49.
Schwyhart was section of the authentic estate improvement team The Pinnacle Group, a privately held corporation that included Thornton, Collins Haynes, Johnnie Bryan “J.B.” Hunt and Tim Graham. The Pinnacle Team also performed a purpose in the progress of the Pinnacle Hills Promenade retail centre, which opened in 2006.
The Pinnacle Group partnership dissolved soon after Hunt’s loss of life in December 2006, much less than amicably. That and the Wonderful Economic downturn were being section of Schwyhart’s really public and complex drop from grace. There were numerous lawsuits, a Chapter 11 individual bankruptcy, and Schwyhart was even evicted from his residence and office environment near Pinnacle Place Club in 2011.
In accordance to the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Bill and Carolyn Schwyhart submitted for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection in Texas in July 2018, professing additional than $82 million in credit card debt, largely relevant to small business ventures that experienced failed through the economic crisis from 2009 to 2011. The personal bankruptcy courtroom granted them a discharge of those people debts. Past year, a Texas choose denied the objection to discharge that one of the lenders, CHP LLC, had submitted, discovering that the Schwyharts were genuine debtors deserving of a discharge.
According to court docket filings, the Schwyharts moved from Arkansas to Dallas in March 2018 for overall health explanations.
Schwyhart was involved in several civic teams whilst living in Northwest Arkansas, including the Northwest Arkansas Council, and management roles with the Rotary Club of Rogers and Rogers-Lowell Location Chamber of Commerce.
Then-Mayor John Sampier appointed Schwyhart to the Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport Authority when it was arranged in 1992. Previous Gov. Mike Huckabee also appointed Schwyhart to serve on the Arkansas Financial Development Commission.
In lieu of bouquets, the Schwyhart loved ones has asked for donations to the Solitary Dad or mum Scholarship Fund of Northwest Arkansas or Northwest Arkansas Children’s Shelter.
