The second of eight children to parents Hyrum Willard Marriott and Ellen Morris Marriott, John Willard Marriott was born at Marriott Settlement near Ogden, Utah on September 17, 1900. Known to the family simply Bill, young John Willard helped raise sheep and sugar beets on his father’s farm in the Church of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints. His father entrusted him with a significant degree of responsibility on the farm at an early age. As a direct result, Bill rapidly learned to rely on ingenuity and his own wisdom. While in awe of the expansiveness and the picturesque backdrop of the Rockies as a youngster, Bill imagined something greater beyond the confines of his family’s Mormon farm. He quenched his wanderlust by becoming a missionary for the Church in New England at the age of 19. Traveling on his way home through Washington, D.C. after finishing his service during the summer of 1921 he recognized a tailor-made market for A&W root beer (Wikipedia, n.d.).Marriott returned to Utah to enroll at the Weber Stake Academy in Ogden, and then shortly thereafter graduated from the University of Utah in 1926. Remembering the ready market of thirsty tourists in the nation’s capital, both he…