This is the third installment of a Women In History feature written about women members of the Arkansas House of Representatives from Warren. Much of the information contained in this comes from the new University of Arkansas Press volume: “Stateswomen: A Centennial History of Arkansas Women Legislators 1922-2022,” by Lindsley Armstrong Smith and Stephen L. Smith.
Special to the Saline River Chronicle
While some may say Marian Owens Ingram Shultz had it easy in life.
She can tell you as the mother of three active, over achieving kids, and running a small clothing business with her first husband, just off Main Street in downtown Warren, was certainly no picnic or for those fearing long days, entrepreneurship challenges, and plain old, hard work.
Born September 17, 1936, in Beebe, Marian Daniel was the daughter of a full-time mother, Arlene McCulloch and William Elvis Daniel, a funeral director.
Her dad was later White County Coroner and the Circuit Clerk of White County.
As a student at Searcy High School, she played the drums in the marching band and the tympani in the concert season. She wrote a school column for the Searcy newspaper, the Daily Citizen, and she attended Girls State in 1953. She also played the accordion at several community celebrations and was in the Girls Ensemble, Latin Club, Thespians and Searcy High’s pep squad, the Lionettes.
After graduation in 1954, she earned an associate’s degree in business at Arkansas State Teachers College in Conway (now the University of Central Arkansas). In 1957, she married men’s clothing store owner Wayne Owens of Warren.
The couple had a store on Cypress Street just doors down from the Eagle Democrat in the early 1970s.
The couple has three children, Warren folks will remember, Cindy, Dan and Bill. Today all three are civic and business leaders in their own communities.
Dan would later enter the publishing business and was at one time a part owner of Arkansas Business. He later moved to North Carolina where he started a similar business publication in North Carolina. He is now the owner at Senior Housing Services LLC, a commercial real estate company in Charlotte NC selling nursing homes and assisted living facilities in several states.
Cynthia has been teaching French in a school in Louisiana for the past 10 plus years.
William has a residential real estate company in the Charlotte, North Carolina area, according to Marian.
While in Warren, she studied real estate and became a realtor, opening her own real estate company – Warren Realty. Marian Owens served on the Warren Housing Authority Board and eight years on the Warren City Council. She was the very first female to serve on the Warren City Council. She was also a member of the Rotary Club, Women’s Club, Southeast Arkansas Board of Realtors Association, and the National Association of Realtors.
Wayne Owens died in 1990, later she married Marlin Perry Ingram, who also preceded her in death. In 2020, she married John Schultz, the couple lives in Hot Springs Village.
Her path to the Arkansas House was not without drama and controversy.
Getting to the Arkansas State House of Representatives was also not such an easy road back in 1992. Long time and former Speaker of the House from Warren, John Lipton, resigned to accept the position as an Arkansas State Highway Commissioner.
But Marian Owens was up for the challenge and the brief, but pivotal nomination from the Democratic party over two male challengers who also desired the position.
Former House Speaker John Lipton, resigned his House seat to be appointed to the Arkansas Highway Commission, but it was after the ballot had closed for the upcoming election. Lipton, a Democrat, has no opposition in either the Republican or Democratic parties.
Since the House seat encompassed both Bradley and Calhoun Counties, the two Democratic County Chairman, Tom Wagnon from Bradley County and Joe Dunn of Calhoun County, called a convention of Democrats on both county committees to select, from applicants, the person to fill the ballot.
The late Sue Wagnon, a nursing home administrator and former state Rep. Bill Wells, both of Bradley County, along with Owens, applied for the position.
All three candidates spoke to the Democrats assembled and the winner of the voting was Owens to fill the position Lipton had vacated.
In 1994, Owens won re-election over former Bradley County Judge Joe Fowler in the regular Democratic primary for the House seat. She was unopposed in the November General Election. She was unopposed in all primaries and the General Election in 1996, and was then term limited by the Arkansas State Constitution at the time.
Her legislative record was one of progressive ideas.
Although it failed to pass, she sponsored legislation to secure the capitol doors with security devices. In 1995, she passed legislation requiring background checks for new teaching applicants. After the session, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, published articles about educators with criminal backgrounds and loopholes in the 1995 law, which helped Owens pass stronger criminal background legislation in 1997.
She also sponsored legislation increasing UAMS freshman enrollment positions and legislation allowing school districts to shift the annual school board elections to the general election in even-numbered years.
After her legislative service, she sold real estate in Oklahoma and North Carolina. She has retired after 45 years of selling real estate and now lives in Hot Springs Village with her husband, John Shultz.
Next Week: Joyce Dees, a banker, turned legislator, turned health care advisor.
