Reporter editor
Last week Joan and Dan Ratliff announced through their Realtor, Kathryne Parsley Roddam, that they were selling the oldest motel in Texas, Rainbow Courts. Rockdale has been buzzing because of this information so I wanted to sit down with the three of them to get the whole story.
HISTORY— First a little history from Joan and Dan. At the turn of the last century when Henry Ford put America on wheels, the country’s population became potential tourists, and a tourist needed a place to “camp” at night. Thus was born the tourist camp.
US 79 wasn’t paved yet, but that didn’t stop Monroe Bullock from building an “oasis” for tourists and migrant workers alike. So, Rockdale’s Rainbow Courts Tourist Camp became a 1918 addition to the Milam County landscape.
In the 1930s, Monroe’s brother, Ira Benjamin Bullock, Joan’s grandfather, joined at what was then called The Rainbow Courts, and they became a Central Texas bed and breakfast long before the bed and breakfast craze had begun.
Later Joan’s mother, Algia Mae Bullock, ran the place and was known for the big breakfasts she cooked for patrons. When she decided she wanted to retire, Joan and Dan decided to buy Rainbow Courts from her and move back to Rockdale after spending time in Houston, New York and St. Louis after marrying in 1978. Dan was involved in banking during all of those years and Joan was in the medical field, once working for the famous Dr. DeBakey, the inventor of open-heart surgery.
THIRD GENERATION— On June 1, 1992, Joan and Dan bought Rainbow Courts from her mother and father who had been running it since 1975.
When asked what she found in 1992 when she bought the place, Joan said, “A hot mess! We were very naive about running a hospitality business. Both the motel and the general east Rockdale neighborhood had become a place of ill repute, and it was our task to change that little by little.”
The first four years we took everything down to the studs and fixed the wiring and were able to move some walls and make the rooms into what we had envisioned.”
Now, mind you, Dan was working all this time in San Antonio and was only home on the weekends, so Joan was mostly responsible for the work during the beginning. She became her own contractor and said she would not have made it without the help of Wayne Brinkley and Ray Rubio and all of the Rockdale Rotary people. In addition to the remodeling, she also mowed the grass, did maintenance and cleaned the rooms.
“Aloma Walker, with Alcoa, was very helpful in turning our business around. She brought a new plant manager out to see us and the hotel, and he was so impressed that it was decided that all Alcoa visitors would be staying at Rainbow Courts from that moment on,” Joan said.
ACCOLADES— Joan and Dan worked very hard to renovate everything into its now-beautiful state, and eventually started buying adjacent properties and turning them into corporate apartments and longterm leases with their own kitchens.
In 2015, Rainbow Courts became a Recorded Historic Landmark which is the highest historic recognition awarded by the State of Texas.
For the past 10 years Rainbow Courts has received the TripAdvisor Travelers’ Choice Award. This accolade, which honors hospitality excellence, is given only to establishments which consistently achieve outstanding traveler reviews on TripAdvisor. Only the top one percent of businesses listed on TripAdvisor receive this prestigious award. Due to the number of years of awards and exemplary ratings, Rainbow Courts is now in the website’s Hall of Fame.
MARKETING— When asked what her reaction to getting the phone call from Joan and Dan to sell Rainbow Courts, Realtor Kathryne Parsley Roddam said, “I was surprised, super excited, honored and proud that they chose me. When I got off the phone I told (husband) Ward that he was not going to believe that phone call! They told me they wanted a local Realtor to sell the property and I couldn’t be more pleased to sell this historic landmark for such nice people as Joan and Dan.”
Af ter re t i r ing f rom a teaching career, Kathryne joined Keller Williams Northwest Market Center in Austin on the team of Lisa Spencer Kosub, daughter of Judith and the late Charles Matula.
“Keller Williams is great company to work for and there are so many opportunities to market this property with this company. They are way ahead of the curve on technology,” she said.
“As luck would have it, I was chosen to be a panelist and speaker at our weekly meeting of 500 agents and I had just finished a threeday photo and video shoot of Rainbow Courts so I was able to present it to all the agents. I even had some prospective buyers call me the very first day I listed it because the property is so unique,” she added.
“And, because of that uniqueness, I had 91 photos to use but only had space for 40 in the listing. Every room is special and different than the one next to it. Listing the property with Keller Williams gets the property shown on over 350 websites worldwide, so I’m sure to find the perfect investor,” Roddam said.
THE FUTURE— When asked what Joan and Dan will do after the sale is closed, they said they haven’t decided yet.
“We have family all over who want us to come. Hopefully lots of travel will be involved,” Joan said. “This was a very difficult and emotional decision to make. I think I would like to be footloose and fancy-free for a while.”
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