J. Willard Marriott

John Willard Marriott Sr. (September 17, 1900 – August 13, 1985) was an American entrepreneur and businessman.

After completing his mission, he passed through Washington, D.C., on his way home during the sweltering summer months of 1921.

While there:

Marriott graduated from Weber College (now Weber State University), where he served as student body president, with an associate degree in June 1923 and from the University of Utah, where he affiliated with Phi Delta Theta, with a bachelor's degree in June 1926.

After Marriott earned his bachelor's degree, the president of Weber, Aaron Tracy, who had assisted Marriott to enroll there by helping him make up secondary education credits missed due to the Marriott family's ranching efforts, employed him at the school in Ogden.

Marriott soon felt the urge, however, to be his own boss.

He heard about a cousin's A&W Root Beer franchise and, remembering his experience seeing so many people suffer through the brutal summer heat of Washington, D.C., he decided to look into a venture there.

The Marriott company rose from a small root beer stand in Washington, D.C., in 1927 to a chain of family restaurants by 1932, to its first motel in 1957.

In 1927, he secured from A&W Root Beer the franchise rights for Washington, D.C.; Baltimore, Maryland; and Richmond, Virginia; he then moved to Washington to open a nine-stool root beer stand there with his business partner, Hugh Colton.

They opened on May 20, 1927, at 3128 14th Street, NW.

He returned to Utah two weeks later and married Alice Sheets on June 9, 1927.

With the approach of cooler Autumn months, and with the addition of Mexican food items to the menu, the stand became The Hot Shoppe, a popular family restaurant.

In 1928, he opened the first drive-in east of the Mississippi, and the business was incorporated as Hot Shoppes, Inc. in Delaware in 1929.

During the Second World War, the business expanded to include the management of food services in defense plants and government buildings, such as the U.S. Treasury.

Marriott's restaurant chain grew, and the company went public in 1953.

In 1957, he expanded his business to hotels, opening the first Marriott hotel—actually a motel, the Twin Bridges Motor Hotel in Arlington, Virginia.

The company became Marriott, Inc. in 1967.

Two large chains were added to the group, the Big Boy family restaurants in 1967 and Roy Rogers Family Restaurants in 1968.

Over the years, Marriott's company interests expanded.

Continuing with food services, Marriott eventually invented airline in-flight food service.

This segment of their enterprise continues to be a large part of their business, providing food services to many major airlines.

Marriott also provides food services to many colleges, elementary schools, and other venues.

Marriott was an energetic worker and rarely rested, preferring to run his company.

Many attested to the fact that he ate, lived, breathed, and dreamed about how to run and improve his company:

Even after the company grew to include hundreds of restaurants and hotels, Marriott vowed to personally inspect every establishment at least four times a year.

Marriott tempered his rigid demands for perfection with devotion to his employees.

According to his son, Bill Jr.,:

According to Marriott himself (from a videotaped segment):

Marriott's legacy continues today through the continuance of the company he founded and through his community involvement and philanthropy.

Marriott was a faithful member of the LDS Church and sought to share the church's teachings with others by placing a copy of the Book of Mormon in each hotel room, alongside a copy of a Gideon Bible—a tradition that has endured.

He also donated funds to the church's flagship tertiary educational institution, Brigham Young University (BYU), resulting in the naming of BYU's 19,000-seat multi-purpose arena (Marriott Center) in his honor.

While serving as home to the BYU Cougars men's and women's college basketball teams, the center also hosts various cultural events and religious devotionals.

By the time he died in 1985, the Marriott company operated 1,400 restaurants and 143 hotels and resorts worldwide, including two theme parks, earned US$4.5 billion in revenue annually with 154,600 employees.

The company's interests also extended to a line of cruise ships.

Marriott was born at Marriott Settlement (present-day Marriott-Slaterville, Utah), the second of eight children of Hyrum Willard Marriott and Ellen Morris Marriott.

As a child, "Bill", as J. Willard was called, helped to raise sugar beets and sheep on his family's farm.

At age 13, Marriott raised lettuce on several fallow acres on the farm and the harvest at summer's end brought $2,000, which Marriott gave to his father.

The next year, Hyrum entrusted Marriott, his eldest son, with the sale of a herd of 3,000 sheep, sending him and the sheep unescorted by rail to San Francisco.

At the age of 19 and as a participating member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), he undertook a mission for two years, being assigned to New England.

He was the founder of the Marriott Corporation (which became Marriott International in 1993), the parent company of the world's largest hospitality, hotel chains, and food services companies.