Then we started buying trucks in Rogers in 1969, before taking over a trucking company there. They were in school, so Johnnie wanted me full time on the business. “At the time my son was 7 and my daughter was 11. Johnelle recounts how she really wanted to be a full-time mother and homemaker, but Johnnie must have seen her business potential and her magical way with people. I would type letters to potential customers and financial statements.” When we started our own business he asked me to help out part time. I was fortunate enough to take care of my kids and my house. From the time we married I did not work because he worked odd hours. We started selling stock so we could raise enough money to start the business. “All those years it was just an idea while he was a truck driver. He started his own hugely successful chicken litter company using rice hulls in 1961 in Stuttgart, but Johnelle says he’d had the idea 15 years before it started. Johnnie had big dreams despite his humble background. Johnelle and Johnnie Bryan Hunt as they appeared on the cover of Arkansas Business in 1988. He and Johnny Cash used to pick cotton together as kids, later on Johnny and June would come up and stay with us from time to time.” “He grew up picking cotton,” says Johnelle. ![]() Johnnie would later buy Johnelle a ring with a significantly larger diamond, something more befitting a multimillionaire’s wife, but to this day Johnelle treasures the simple ring with the tiny diamond, because she knows how hard Johnnie had to work to pay it off. ![]() Johnnie proposed to Johnelle on their way to her high school graduation with a small diamond ring he had bought with $80 borrowed from his aunt. She bore the wrath of her friend, who didn’t speak to her for several days afterward, but she got her man. Johnelle’s friend rode up front with Johnnie, but Johnelle was so taken with the dashing young man that when he passed through town the next night she outran all her friends so that she could sit next to him. ![]() The couple met one evening when he was driving through Heber Springs and offered a ride to Johnelle and her friends - the Dirty Dozen, they called themselves.
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