Summary biography of JW Marriott part 1
Bill Marriott is the founder of the modern-day hotel chain Marriott international. Previously the company was founded by his father, JW Marriott, purely in the restaurant business. Later on, the business branched off into the hotel industry. That’s why I will divide my biography into 2 pieces. One for the original J.W. Marriot and one for ‘Bill’ Marriott(his son). The stories are closely intertwined since Bill Marriott participated in the family business since his freshman year of the university. I consider bullet points as the best and easy way to summarize important events in their lives
J.W. Marriott:
Elizabeth, the grandma of J.W. Marriott:
His grandma, Elizabeth was a pious Mormon who had a hard life in 19th-century England. Her mom died when she was a child and her dad died when she was a teenager
Later on, she migrated to the US upon the calling of the Mormon church to Utah. After that, her lover died saving her in a fire accident and she received a deep scar. She still carried the picture of her first love till the end of her life.
Elizabeth was destitute and married another Mormon as his second wife.
Hyrum Marriott, the father of JW Marriott and a son of Elizabeth:
Was opinionated and quick-tempered. Left his house at 14 y.o. due to an argument with his father
Married distant cousin, Ellen Morris
Took up harness making, and became a prominent farmer and sheepherder
His father died soon after he got married
He became quite a prosperous farmer with a mansion and 100 acres of territory
Was the first family in town to own an automobile(was called a horseless carriage at the time)
J.W. Marriott(1900-1985), the father of ‘Bill’ Marriott(1932):
Both his parents and grandparents got married due to convenience but later on developed a deep love
Had 7 siblings and was the second oldest among his siblings after his sister.
His mom would read him and his siblings the bible before going to bed
His mom would tell her kids, ''I’d rather have a stone tied around your necks and have you cast into the ocean than to have you forget your religion and not live it every day of your lives.''
He was brought up on a farm.
He would buy soda for his younger siblings as a reward for working hard on a farm
If he displeased his father, he was whipped. Once he was locked in a closet for two hours and then sent to bed without supper.
He was camping far from the house in the mountains since he was 13 in order to take care of the Marriott sheep flock
At age of 15, he was sent on a train with thousands of sheep to sell in San Fransisco
He was awed by San Fransisco and attended the 1915 World’s Fair
At age of 16, he went to send sheep to Omaha and was put off the train because the conductor considered him too young. After that, he caught up by hopping on the next train.
He was absent from his high-school half of the time due to the work of looking after the sheep far from town.
At 19 y.o. he was not able to finish high school on time due to the worldwide flu epidemic and decided to go on a 2-year mission as per the requirement of his church instead.
His family sold their car and a golden arm watch in order to finance his mission.
He was sent to New York for his religious mission
The husband of his cousin, George Bushnell, was a vice president for a fast-growing company in New York. Later on, he would become an early investor in Marriott’s venture
When preaching, elder Marriott condemned a man to hell for not listening to the gospel message at a train station
Sometimes his preaching would attract a hostile crowd
When preaching as a guest in someone’s house the mob surrounded the house and the host had to talk with the crowd while young missionaries escaped through the backdoor.
J.W. developed incredible communication skills and learned how to work with people during his mission
His fellow missionary, Hugh Colton, would be his first business partner in opening a restaurant venue
He graduated with a 2-year associate degree from Weber university and as a student body president at the age of 23
He was selling woollen underwear to loggers every summer. Each season he would make around 50,000 dollars in today’s money as a student working 12 hours shifts every day.
He continued his studies at the University of Utah and was hired by his friends to work at a catering company supplying university parties.
His father took a bank loan to buy 3,000 sheep
He had to take a gap year in order to drive sheep from Nevada to Utah. After selling sheep, most of the money went to repay the bank loan, from now on, he always had a distrust of debt.
In his final year of study, he lead a team of 45 students to sell woollen underwear and became a district supervisor. He earned 70,000 dollars of today’s equivalent money working 16-hour shifts.
He met his future wife at the university and her dad was a Bishop of the Mormon church and a lawyer by profession.
She got into university at the age of 15 and met J.W. Marriott at the age of 18. There was 7 years difference between her and young Marriott.
On their first date, he showed her pictures of his sheep. Then he took her to the mountain range to view his family herd - unbeknownst to her, it was really the bank’s herd. In the summer of his graduation, he proposed to her and she accepted.
At the age of 25 y.o. he graduated from the university.
Marriott’s cousin opened the ''A&W'' franchise in Fort Wayne, Indiana.
J.W. opened a 9-seat ''A&W'' franchise in Washington D.C. with his missionary friend, Hugh Colton at the age of 26.
His fiancée was graduating from university at the age of 19 so he had to find the money for the ring so he decided to try to lend money from a bank
He was turned down by the bank due to his father’s poor credit history. Afterwards, he hated banks.
He was running 2 hours late for his own wedding. Called his fiancée who was in tears thinking that he ditched her, after hearing that it was only ''money'' problem she was overjoyed that the wedding would actually take place.
At the age of 27 y.o., he settled down in D.C. in an apartment building with his business partners the Coltons living one floor below.
He opened a second root beer restaurant
His wife started working as a bookkeeper in his company
He was late in payments to his ''A&W'' franchisor as well as sometimes substituted his product when he would run out of stock, thus violating the contract with ''A&W''.
He was caught violating the contract by a ''mystery shopper'', the spy sent by ''A&W''.
His wife used her college Spanish skills to learn popular Tex-Mex offerings recipes in the nearby Mexican embassy. Afterwards, they were one of the first restaurants on the East Coast to offer Tex-Mex food.
He renamed his 2 small restaurants into ''Hot Shoppe''
When he was turning 28 the profits were anaemic and the business couldn’t sustain 2 families. Both JW and his partner Colton wanted to quit.
In the end, they agreed that JW would buy out Colton’s share of the business for 86,000 dollars of today’s money, which he had to borrow from a bank. While Colton returned to Utah
He opened the first drive-in restaurant in D.C. that was a huge success compared to the other two stores
By the age of 29, his company employed over 80 people in over 3 locations.
He filed the incorporation papers and thus put his wife as the president of the company. He wasn’t even listed as a board member. At the third board meeting, JW Marriott was named the president of the company.
He had many powerful friends from LDS/Mormon church such as Senator Reed Smoot and lawyer J. Reuben Clark. Reed Smoot was the Apostle of LDS while Sunday school was taught by Reuben Clark.
When the Great Depression hit the country his business did not suffer at all. On the other hand, his father went bankrupt and he had to buy his farm back from the bank for 86,000 dollars in today’s money. Furthermore, he spent another 95,000 dollars to relocate his parents and sister to Ogden. He did not want his father to continue running the farm.
A year later, his widowed mother-in-law married Senator Reed Smoot.
He opened his fifth Hotte Shoppe
For the first time, the Marriotts would attend a dinner with the President of the US, Herbert Hoover, by the invitation of his mother-in-law who used to be a wealthy widow and was now married to a banker.
He was 31 when he got his oldest son “Bill” Marriott with his 23-year-old wife.
His brother Paul mastered the restaurant business and became JW’s right hand.
FDR was challenging the bottom line of Marriott’s business with his minimum wage and Union collective-bargaining laws.
At the age of 32, he was diagnosed with incurable cancer
They told him that he has up to a year. So he took his entire family on a country trip. He asked two LDS men to pray him a healing blessing. By Christmas, he was back to work.
His sister had married a man who eventually abandoned her and her child.
As can be seen, he had a strict religious upbringing combined with working from a young age. Furthermore, he got many powerful connections from his church. At the age of 25 he started his first business. In the next part we are going to continue from where we left.