[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 14]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages 19346-19347]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




             TRIBUTE TO ARKANSAS BUSINESSMAN JACK STEPHENS

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. MARION BERRY

                              of arkansas

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, July 28, 2005

  Mr. BERRY. Mr. Speaker, I rise here today to pay tribute to a great 
businessman, Mr. Jack Stephens, who spent a lifetime helping Arkansas 
gain a competitive edge in the global economy. His talent and 
generosity led to important advances in business, transportation, 
medicine, and the arts that have left a lasting mark on our state.
  Jack Stephens was born on August 9, 1923 in Grant County, Arkansas, 
the youngest of six children. He grew up on a farm near Prattsville 
during the great Depression. Coming from humble beginnings, the hard 
times and his parents taught him the values of self-reliance, 
diligence, integrity and hard work. His father, A.J. Stephens once told 
his young son, ``It's no disgrace to be poor, it's a disgrace to stay 
poor.'' His father also advised, ``Success is not a destiny to be 
reached, but the quality of the journey we make.''
  The advice from his father stayed with him throughout his life. In 
his younger years Jack Stephens worked on the family farm behind a mule 
drawn plow and picking cotton. By age 15, he held summer jobs as a 
bellhop and shoeshine boy at the Barlow Hotel in Hope, Arkansas. He 
added the delivery of telegrams to his duties when he realized he could 
do so after his normal hotel shift was finished.
  A bright student, Mr. Stephens attended public schools in Prattsville 
and graduated high school from Columbia Military Academy in Columbia, 
Tennessee. He attended the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville and 
graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 1946. (Class of '47.)
  Poor eyesight prevented Mr. Stephens from active duty in the Navy so 
he took a job offered to him on his graduation day by his brother W.R. 
``Witt'' Stephens. With a simple handshake in his room at Annapolis, 
Mr. Stephens agreed to join his brother in Little Rock at a municipal 
bond house.
  Witt was outgoing, a natural salesman. Jack was quiet, unassuming and 
studious. A decade later, in 1956, Jack became an equal partner with 
his brother and became President and Chief Executive Officer the 
following year (1957). The two brothers acquired the Fort Smith Gas 
Company and renamed it the Arkansas Oklahoma Gas Company.
  The pair also acquired an oil and gas exploration firm and named it 
Stephens Production Company.
  Both investments proved to be the catalyst for expansion from a 
municipal bond business to a diversified financial group that became 
Stephens Inc.
  Jack Stephens served as President and CEO of Stephens Inc. from 1957 
until 1986

[[Page 19347]]

when Stephens Group, Inc. was formed and became the parent company of 
Stephens Inc. His son, Warren, assumed the leadership of Stephens Inc. 
at that time. Mr. Stephens became Chairman of Stephens Group, Inc. that 
year, a title he carried for the remainder of his life.
  Over the decades, Mr. Stephens led the company to great heights. 
Under his leadership, Stephens Inc. invested or assisted in many 
enterprises including the former Union Life Insurance Company, the 
former Systematics, Donrey Media (now Stephens Media Group), Dillards, 
Alltel, Wal-Mart, Tyson Foods and many more. Jack Stephens' leadership 
and business acumen was responsible for the creation of hundreds of 
businesses in America and thousands of jobs. Many of those enterprises 
have become Fortune 500 companies, and a number of them are located in 
his native Arkansas.
  In recent years, Mr. Stephens has been recognized for his 
philanthropy but it is something he did all his life. He once told a 
reporter, ``There are only two pleasures associated with money, making 
it and giving it away.'' For over 20 years Jack Stephens has been the 
principal benefactor for The Delta Project, a program designed to 
assist and educate underprivileged children in Arkansas' delta. When he 
sold the Little Rock cable franchise in 1985, he put the profits into 
the City Educational Trust Fund. For 20 years the Trust Fund has 
provided scholarships for students and incentive awards for innovative 
teachers. His gift of $48 million built the Jackson T. Stephens Spine 
and Neurosciences Institute on the campus of the University of Arkansas 
for Medical Sciences (DAMS) campus and financed the purchase of 
equipment for the institute as well as support programs and research.
  The Stephens family has been a life long supporter of the Arkansas 
Arts Center and Jack Stephens donated a portion of his personal art 
collection to the Center as a permanent display. The Stephens Gallery 
currently boasts the works of Degas, Monet, Picasso, Wyeth and more. 
The Stephens display, valued at $22 million at the time of the gift, 
has been recognized as one of the most important art collections in the 
country. It is perhaps the finest art collection in the nation for a 
city the size of Little Rock. Mr. Stephens was also the lead 
contributor for the construction of a new 30,000 square foot wing at 
the Arkansas Arts Center.
  The Episcopal Collegiate School, the campus of which bears his name, 
occupies 31 acres near downtown Little Rock. The total amount of this 
gift has never been made public but Mr. Stephens donated the money to 
purchase the land that comprises the campus. In April 2004, he donated 
$20 million of the announced $30 million endowment for the school. His 
son Warren and Warren's wife, Harriet, donated the remainder of the 
gift. Mr. Stephens also donated $20.4 million for the construction of 
the Jackson T. Stephens Special Events Center on the campus of the 
University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UALR). The facility will become 
the home court for the UALR Trojan basketball team.
  The list of contributions to his community also includes a $5 million 
dollar endowment to Harding University, establishment of the Fulbright 
College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Arkansas, and the 
Bill and Skeeter Dickey Scholarship at the University of Arkansas 
Athletic Department.
  Mr. Stephens's love of sports (football and golf in particular) led 
to a $10 million gift to the U.S. Naval Academy Foundation in 
Annapolis, Maryland. The donation funded the recent renovation at the 
Navy Marine Corp Stadium near the campus which has been renamed Jack 
Stephens Field. The gift is the largest ever made to the Naval Academy.
  When asked by the PGA Tour if he would support the launching of a new 
program to teach golf and its values to children by creating affordable 
and accessible golf facilities, Mr. Stephens surpassed their 
expectations with a $5 million donation to help start The First Tee. 
The program serves children who have not previously been exposed to the 
game of golf.
  Mr. Stephens loved the game of golf and once told a reporter, ``Golf 
is a great teacher in life. The same skills needed to master this game 
are the same skills needed to master life, a life full of unseen 
obstacles and excitement.''
  In 1962, Mr. Stephens was invited to become a member of the Augusta 
National Golf Club. Mr. Stephens served as its fourth chairman (1991-
1998) with the responsibility of overseeing the golf club and the most 
prestigious tournament in golf, the Masters. After turning over the 
duties of chairman to Hootie Johnson in 1998, Mr. Stephens was named 
Chairman Emeritus.
  Mr. Stephens won numerous awards and recognitions during his 
lifetime. He was honored with the Horatio Alger Award in 1980 and he 
was the first recipient of the J. William Fulbright Award given for 
international trade development in 1989.
  Mr. Stephens served on the board of the Little Rock Boys Club, The 
Quapaw Council of The Boy Scouts of America. He served 10 years on the 
University of Arkansas Board of Trustees and was awarded an honorary 
Doctor of Law Degree and a University of Arkansas Distinguished Alumnus 
citation. He was inducted into the Arkansas Business Hall of Fame, the 
Arkansas State Golf Hall of Fame, and the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame.
  Jack Stephens was a proud and loving father and grandfather. He is 
survived by two sons: Jackson T. ``Steve'' Stephens, Jr.; Warren 
Stephens, and his wife, Harriet Stephens; six grandchildren: Caroline 
Stephens, Jackson T. Stephens III, Mason Stephens, Miles Stephens, John 
Stephens and Laura Stephens; two great-grandchildren: Sydney Stephens 
and Bruce Stephens, Jr.; and two adopted children: Kerry LaNoche and 
James Stephens. Mr. Stephens is also survived by two sisters: Jewel 
Mays of Prattsville, Arkansas and Wilma Thornton of Searcy, Arkansas.
  Jack Stephens was an original American success story with roots deep 
in the soil of his home state of Arkansas and his other great devotion, 
the Augusta National Golf Club. His life was filled with many successes 
and his compassion, commitment and dedication resulted in an 
extraordinary journey that touched many lives.
  He was a great Arkansan, American, and friend.

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