W. Dixon Bowles, 66, co-founder of Aristotle, the Little Rock-based Internet service provider and web design company, died Sunday at his home, according to a family statement.
He was an entrepreneur and former entertainer whose business activities ranged over the years from dinner theater management to cutting edge web technology. He’s also known as the founder of The Group, a communal living arrangement that began with a group of musicians in the 1960s. They established a home on Big Piney Creek in the early 1970s and eventually moved to Little Rock, bought adjacent homes in the Quapaw Quarter and undertook a number of business ventures.
The Memphis Commercial-Appeal wrote on extensive feature on The Group in 1971, reprinted here.
Bowles also has an important long-ago connection to the Arkansas Times. In its early struggling years more than 30 years ago, Bowles made a timely loan that helped keep the publication afloat, publisher Alan Leveritt recalled.
The full statement from the family follows:
