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"Before aviation, I grew up on a rather large ranch in East Texas." Her manner is casual and relaxed; soft and inviting, persuasive sans saccharine airs. "It was about 1200 acres. I have two brothers and two sisters. I was the middle child and we had a happy childhood. We played and didn’t have to worry about, you know, being taken by kidnapers. We always had friends over and, with us five children, we would always find something to do." Her eyes, glancing back in time, shown with pleasant reflection.

"We had a big barn out back. It was two-stories and we played a whole lot in it." JoAnn laughs abundantly. "Beyond that we had a hay barn that was probably 40 by 60 feet. In the wintertime we would hang ropes from the rafters and swing off them into the hay. We had lots of horses and rode them a lot. That is one of my fondest memories." Her warm eyes gleamed.

"My dad was a rancher-farmer and my mom was a stay-home mom. Hence we had a pretty good upbringing. Mother always had a garden and we always had fresh vegetables so I think we ate better then most. A friend of mine, Jackie Wilson, and her parents owned a restaurant, the Dixie Maid in Atlanta." JoAnn references her hometown of Atlanta, Texas. "In fact it is still in business. It was owned by them for about 35 years, until they sold it just five years ago. They had the best hamburgers ever. Still when we go to Atlanta I have to have a Dixie Maid hamburger."

JoAnn reminisced that when she went to visit friend Jackie and was invited to share a meal in her home, she greatly anticipated being served a burger and fries that she loved so much. Much to her chagrin, however, the restaurant had a family kitchen in the back where Jackie’s mom prepared for her family the same kind of down-home meals that JoAnn’s own mom cooked. "That was disappointing," JoAnn laughed. But, she reflected on the disappointments and tragedies endured by many people in their growing-up years, her life was sweet.

"It was a fun time growing up. We had some bad times, of course, but I went to school there and got married and had two children, my beautiful daughter and son. I didn’t think at all about aviation as a career back then. I knew that I would have a good life, but I just never thought it would be in aviation. I had flown on commercial flights several times, going to see family and such. I have a lot of cousins that live in Odessa, Texas. Still it was a big change for me when I met Jim."

JoAnn and Jim first met at a backyard bar-b-que hosted by Jim’s older brother, Bill, who now works for the couple as Airpark Office Manager. At the time, all still resided in Atlanta, Texas. "I knew of Jim before that," JoAnn recalled. "He came by my dad’s farm when he was about eleven and hunted game birds. So I’d seen him but we never met."

By the time the social invitation came from Bill and his spouse, JoAnn was a single mom and Jim also was divorced. "That was December of 1982," she recalled. "Jim brought a girlfriend with him to the bar-b-que, we met and talked. He took his girlfriend home, came back and stayed for a long time afterwards. But then we did not talk much after that. Not until much later. Finally in February he called and asked for a Valentine’s date.

"He said that a friend of his had just built a new hangar in Texarkana and he wanted to know if I wanted to go to this Valentines Dance they were having there." JoAnn’s voice lilts with pleasure. "And I said okay, sure. But then the dance almost didn’t happen." Again, she merrily laughs.

"We went to the dance and were sitting around this table and I was thinking that Jim was real handsome. He had on these really nice cowboy boots, too. Then he kind of pulled one leg up over his other knee to cross them, you know, and I saw that he had a whole in the sole! And I thought ‘poor guy, he needs some new boots’!" She laughs more.

"A big commotion started then and I didn’t really know what was happening, but Jim said a guy had just lost his landing gear, right on the runway by the hanger where we were, when he’d come in for a landing. He said I should come on and go with them out there. So five guys and myself piled into this pick-up truck. I had to sit in Jim’s lap," she chortles. "Then we were flying across this field in this truck in the dark!

"Ray Taylor was the guy flying the airplane," JoAnn explained. "The landing gear had folded under his plane but he was not hurt. So that was my introduction to General Aviation. And I was thinking, What have I gotten myself into? Because I didn’t know what we were going to find when we got to the crash site. Jim and the others just said that Ray had crash-landed and we had to get to him fast." They quickly learned that Ray was shaken but fine.

"After dating for a week or so, Jim asked me to go to Dallas with him, to pick up an airplane. That’s what he did at the time. He would bid on aircraft at auction or buy one used, refurbish and sell them. He was in business there in Texas, based on the airport there in Atlanta.

"He told me we were going to Dallas to pick up this airplane. A Cessna 210. It had bellied-in, he told me, but at that time I didn’t know what that meant. And I didn’t know that we were driving, bringing a trailer. I just knew he was buying it to fix it up and thought we would fly out commercial and fly that aircraft that we were going to get back home. So when he came and picked me up pulling a trailer I said to him, ‘My goodness, how do we do that?’ He said, ‘Well, we take the wings off and we put it on the trailer.’ So we went out there and started packing!

"We got it loaded and had not even gotten three miles from Air Salvage of Dallas when we were stopped by a DOT highway inspector. He told us he thought the airplane was too wide to haul down the road. Jim said, before he got out of the truck, ‘Well JoAnn, have you ever been in the tail cone off a aircraft before?’ We were in our late 20s then and I was sitting there shaking my head saying no-o-o-o-o and he told me, well, we might have to take the tail off. But then the officer told us we were okay and gave us a permit to go on, so we did.

"And those were the kinds of messes," she utters the word with a colloquial flavor known only to those who truly appreciate ‘a good mess’ of fresh-picked snap beans, "I got into, dating Jim Collom. Those two years before we got married, and ever since," a wry crinkle arches her lips.

"At the time we married, he wanted to get more into the salvage end of the aviation business. He was working for about 21 different insurance companies at that time. They would call him and say ‘Jim come look at this airplane’ or ‘we have an airplane that needs to be repaired, would you come and get it and take it to your place?’ He had an excellent reputation for being honest and doing very good work. Anyway, a lot of them were wanting him to relocate his base of operations more central to the nation, so we kind of talked about moving to St. Louis, Missouri. But being a country girl, I didn’t want to move into a busy city where you spend half your life in traffic.

"One day coming back from visiting Missouri, we stopped in Marshall, Arkansas. I said then, if we move anywhere I would like to move here. It was just so beautiful. And Jim said, ‘Well, the guys at the Clinton airport asked for us to relocate here. Let’s just go talk to them.’ So that’s how we ended up here and started Arkansas Airframe."

The airframe salvage business which Jim and JoAnn built together grew beyond nationwide acclaim. In addition to establishing a reputation for reliable dependability, honest work and fair prices, Jim’s straightforward aviation acumen and JoAnn’s natural conviviality were a match made in heaven for the professional world.

"We lived in a rental house for a little while. Then we bought property in the Honey Hills subdivision with plans to build a home overlooking the Middle Fork River. We lived there for about three years. But as the years went by, you know, I guess the wide-open spaces were calling me. I wanted to have horses again, and some land to romp and stomp on.

"With all intent on finding other pieces of property, we were driving around one day and came up this road to Holley Mountain. It was the only time we had ever been up here, and I thought it was beautiful, really beautiful. When we got on top of the mountain there was this sign that said ‘land for sale’ and I said why don’t we just go take a look. Jim said, ‘Well, why don’t we just wait and fly over this way in a day or two and see the place from the air?’

"When we flew over, there was an old abounded house that was falling down and the land, you could tell that someone had farmed this land long years ago because there were little saplings growing up all over it. We thought it was nice, that we would find out who owned it and what they wanted for it. Well, this land that we own now was ‘not for sale’ then. The land next to it, 40 acres, was. We though that was pretty too, but this was the land we wanted. We found Robert (friends call him Bob) and Charlotte Tidwell, the owners at that time. They said it was their ranch headquarters and that it was not for sale.

"We kept talking to them, though, and got to know them. They owned thousands of acres through here and Bob was into ham radio, which Jim had always loved and of course I am a ham operator also. Bob and Jim really kind of clicked and became friends. Bob was up in his 70’s by then. Finally one day I just came out and told Bob that I would love to have this property because it is just so beautiful. Jim scolded me for that, because you just don’t admit things like that when you’re negotiating. But later on when Bob did finally sell to us, we found out that was the only reason he did. Because of what I said to him, he could tell I really did love it and that changed his mind."

Once the deal was done, "What instantly popped into Jim’s mind was a runway, where it is right now, on the flat-top mountain. What popped into my mind was Look at all this property with a view! I can have horses & maybe cows if I want them!

"We worked at the Clinton airport for a lot of years. Arkansas Airframe sold and bought aircraft & aircraft parts during that time and I learned how to fly. I had a little Cessna 150 that I owned in partnership with a couple of people and I was scared to death of the thought that I would be piloting. I really did not want to learn to fly at first, but Jim kept after me. He said if something happened when we were flying it would be good for me to know what to do. So I learned.

"The first time I went up, we took off and by the time we rotated I could hear something pounding," JoAnn said the disturbance was highly unsettling until she found out that her Flight Instructor had accidentally left his seat belt hanging out the cockpit door. "It was flapping in the wind, banging on the side of the plane," she elaborated. "He calmly said, ‘When we get to Altitude, I will open the door and get it back in.’ And that’s what he did," she laughed again.

"It was hard, learning to fly. The first hour of flying, keeping my altitude, my air speed and my direction, well, I remember getting back from practice and just flopping down on the couch. It was a lot of tension.

"Then after I had been flying a while I was learning to make my landing. Coming down, looking at the runway, it looked like it was two inches wide. After a while though, everything just kind of clicked and got so much easier. Then I was landing the plane all by myself. Finally, my instructor said it was time for me to solo. Still, I didn’t want to do it. I was just not comfortable with my landings. That’s pretty much the hardest thing of flying. So I practiced landings, over and over. We would take off, then do a crop-duster turn, come right back in and land, then take off again, I don’t know how many times, but I soloed that day in August of 1987, after twelve and a half hours of flying time.

"After learning to fly, I up-graded to the C-172 that I had for many years. Also, I got back into horses." JoAnn’s love for animals, as with her modesty and demure self-confidence, is a carry over from the upbringing of her childhood. "I have Frank, he’s 25 years old now and has been with us for about 13 years. I sold our other horse, my roping horse, about 5 years ago. He really liked to work, chase steers, and I wasn’t doing that much anymore so I sold him. He was a good horse and I still miss him."

The Colloms bought the first chunk of what is now Holley Mountain Airpark in 1991, built their home and started clearing land for the runway Jim envisioned. "We did a lot of work here, too. It was a mess. When we finally got all the brush cleared, we made the grass runway. After running the tractor, plow and cultivator over the ground, we picked up rocks every day for two months."

The 2200-foot grass strip, completed in 1994, was just great for the little single-engine aircraft they had. But, Jim told JoAnn, "You know, this little strip is not going to cut it. For a twin engine aircraft it will have to be longer." And that was when they started talking seriously about building an airpark.

"We talked about it and thought about it for a long time. My concern was what type people, neighbors we would have, because we plan to never leave here. I thought about it a lot," she acknowledges. "Then we decided to do it." Thus, with the casual assuredness that is the founding grace of every remarkable Southern woman, it got done. ~~~

For more information, visit www.HolleyMountainAirpark.com or phone 501-745-8700.

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