Year?s Top 10 Northwest Arkansas Stories

• 1 Tyson Foods Inc. of Springdale buys IBP, decides it doesn’t want IBP, then is forced to go through with the $4.7 billion acquisition.

• 2 Reynolds Razorback Stadium’s $106 million expansion/face lift makes it one of the nicest facilities in the Southeastern Conference.

• 3 U.S. Rep. Asa Hutchinson, a Republican, is appointed head of the Drug Enforcement Agency by President Bush and sworn in by fellow Arkansan and 8th Circuit Court Judge Morris S. Arnold.

• 4 Vying to fill Hutchinson’s vacated House seat, dark horse and State Rep. Mike Hathorn, D-Huntsville, gives eventual winner John Boozman, an optometrist from Rogers, a close shave.

Boozman won the seat held by Republicans since 1967 with a 55- to 45-percent victory.

• 5 Don Tyson retires as senior chairman of Tyson Foods, completing son John Tyson’s gradual ascension to the poultry throne and officially marking the third generation of family control of the company.

• 6 Jack Frost is convicted for embezzling about $1.8 million from Bernice Jones, the Springdale philanthropist.

• 7 Ten local venture capitalists ponied up $3 million in funding for Virtual Satellite Corp. of Fayetteville, then Beta Rubicon Inc. of Fayetteville staged a national seed investing seminar that drew regional attention.

Synergy from the two events sparked the first real interest in supporting local startups and prompted venture firm Arkansas Capital Corp. to open a Fayetteville office.

• 8 Rogers construction continues to boom with Scottsdale Center, Pinnacle Hills and Village on the Creeks drawing commercial business away from Washington County.

• 9 Hospitals gravitated toward Interstate 540 including Washington Regional Hospital in Fayetteville, Willow Creek Women’s Hospital in Johnson and Northwest Medical Center of Benton County in Bentonville.

Mercy Health System, which owns St. Mary’s hospital in Rogers, also has acquired land adjacent to I-540 in Rogers but has not yet announced plans for any construction.

• 10 Arkansas Best Corp. of Fort Smith sold subsidiary, G.I. Trucking Co. to Estes Express Lines of Richmond, Va., to further focus on its most profitable divisions.

The $40 million cash infusion helped lower the company’s debt, boost its stock price and position Arkansas Best nicely heading into 2002.