FAYETTEVILLE — During a 1994 meeting of University of Arkansas baseball fans, Willard Walker listened as then-UA athletics director Frank Broyles discussed the need for $1 million to kick-start construction for a new baseball stadium.
The next day, Walker and his son, Johnny Mike, met with Broyles and then-baseball coach Norm DeBriyn and pledged the $1 million requested. The donation gave the Razorbacks $2 million earmarked for the project that would eventually become Baum Stadium. Charlie Baum donated $1 million two years earlier.
"The four of us met, and I'll never forget Willard Walker said, 'Frank, I'll give that million and I want that last dollar to be the last brick in that building.