Charles (Chuck) Burton

After graduation I attended Centre College. After graduation from Centre in 1966, I attended Princeton Theological Seminary for one year and one year off campus in New York. New York got me. I ended up in the municipal bond business on Wall Street for 2 1/2 years and was picked up by Development Research Associates (then a division of Booze Allen & Hamilton) in LA. I loved the work, but hated LA. I returned to Louisville in late 1969 and went to work in Lexington for Spindletop Research for a couple of years. In 1972, I got the opportunity to work for Harvey Sloane. That lead me to work with and then for the developers of the Galleria. That was fun and got me into the shopping center business in Owensboro, KY. During my time in Louisville, Lexington and Owensboro, I married Marsha Bates and we had three children (Chase, Jessica and Emilie). When that marriage ended, I went to work for a Canadian company in Houston in 1985. I married Annette Harber, from Knoxville, TN, and we had three children (Tate, Merritt and Sloan)--we all lovingly refer to them as the first and second litter. From Houston, the company transferred us to Dallas, TX for a couple of years. Loved Dallas. Once again, opportunity knocked and we moved to New Canaan, CT and I worked in New York for a German company. It soon became clear that working and living up north was not so much fun. We decided to head back south and ended up in Nashville where I worked in real estate development and Annette had a very successful run in the office leasing business. My business kept leading me to Knoxville and we finally made the move to Knoxville. Annette found an opportunity in the wireless telecommunications industry doing cell tower site acquisition. Eventually, we decided to turn that work into a business in 2000 and we have been doing that ever since and love it. Very rewarding in many ways. Lots of jumping around but the experiences were invaluable. As long as the business is chugging along, it looks like retirement will just have to wait for a while. Someday......

The one story that always comes to my mind is the "trash can explosion". Joe Cunningham, Bruce Chang and I had discovered fulminate of mercury, and its wonderful properties as a delayed heat source. Now, attach the delay fuse to an M80 and drop it into a trash can (the kind with a swinging door). BOOM! But we were half way down the hall when the trash can went BOOM. Somehow, we dodged a bullet and never got caught. If we did that today we would be on some terrorist watch list or in jail somewhere. Joe and I have laughed about that for years. Legend. Right after graduation from high school, Joe Cunningham, Bruce Chang and I went to New York City and hit every jazz club in Manhattan at least once and even met a couple of real jazz stars. Again, Joe and I have talked about that for years. Joe died this year. I miss him. I had been planning a trip to Guam after the first of the year to hang with him. I really regret that will not happen. Last....Worst Class: German; Best Class: Mrs. Kerwin's Sr. English; Most Useful Class: Typing.

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