Conway, Arkansas, United States

🇺🇸 Conway is a city in the U.S. state of Arkansas and the county seat of Faulkner County, located in the state's most populous Metropolitan Statistical Area, Central Arkansas. Although considered a suburb of Little Rock, Conway is unusual in that the majority of its residents do not commute out of the city to work. The city also serves as a regional shopping, educational, work, healthcare, sports, and cultural hub for Faulkner County and surrounding areas. Conway's growth can be attributed to its jobs in technology and higher education; among its largest employers being Acxiom, the University of Central Arkansas, Hendrix College, Insight Enterprises, and many technology start-up companies. Conway is home to three post-secondary educational institutions, earning it the nickname "The City of Colleges".

Conway is the eighth-largest city in Arkansas. Central Arkansas, the Little Rock-North Little Rock-Conway, AR Metropolitan Statistical Area, is ranked 75th largest in the United States with 734,622 people in 2016. Conway is part of the larger Little Rock–North Little Rock, AR Combined Statistical Area, ranked the country's 60th largest CSA.

History The city of Conway was founded by Asa P. Robinson, who came to the area shortly after the Civil War. Robinson was the chief engineer for the Little Rock-Fort Smith Railroad (now the Union Pacific). Part of his compensation was the deed to a tract of land, one square mile, located near the old settlement of Cadron. When the railroad came through, Robinson deeded a small tract of his land back to the railroad for a depot site. He laid off a town site around the depot and named it "Conway Station" in honour of a famous Arkansas family. Conway Station contained two small stores, two saloons, a depot, some temporary housing, and a post office. Despite being founded as a railroad town, there is currently no passenger service; this is attributed to the increasing emphasis placed on cars.

In 1878, Father Joseph Strub, a priest in the Roman Catholic Holy Ghost Fathers, arrived in Arkansas. A native of Alsace-Lorraine, Strub was expelled from Prussia during the Kulturkampf in 1872. He moved to the United States, settling in Pittsburgh, where he founded Duquesne University in October 1878.

Difficulties with Bishop John Tuigg led Strub to leave Pittsburgh in late October 1878 to travel to Conway. In 1879, Strub convinced the Little Rock and Fort Smith Railroad to deed 200,000 acres (810 km²) along the northern side of the Arkansas River to the Holy Ghost Fathers in order to found the St. Joseph Colony. This included land on which Father Strub founded and built St. Joseph Catholic Church of Conway. As part of the land deal, the railroad offered land at 20 cents per acre to every German immigrant. In order to attract Roman Catholic Germans to Conway and the surrounding areas, Father Strub wrote The Guiding Star for the St. Joseph Colony. In addition to extolling the qualities of Conway and the surrounding area, Father Strub provided information on how best to travel from Europe to Conway. By 1889, over 100 German families had settled in Conway, giving the town many of its distinctively German street and business names.

Geography Conway is located in south-western Faulkner County. Interstate 40 passes through the north and east sides of the city, with access from Exits 124 through 132. Via I-40, Little Rock is 30 miles (48 km) to the south, and Russellville is 47 miles (76 km) to the west . West (307 km) of Oklahoma City.

According to the United States Census Bureau, Conway has a total area of 45.6 square miles (118.1 km²), of which 45.3 square miles (117.4 km²) is land and 0.2 square miles (0.6 km²), or 0.54%, is water.

Economy Conway was home to one of the world's largest school bus manufacturers, IC Corporation. The Conway plant was one of only two IC manufacturing plants; the other is located in Tulsa, Oklahoma. IC Corporation is a wholly owned subsidiary of Navistar International Corporation of Lisle, Illinois. IC was previously known as American Transportation (AmTran) Corporation and Ward Body Works. The company was founded in 1933. IC Corporation closed its plant and moved all bus manufacturing operations to its Tulsa plant in 2010, largely due to incentives offered by the city of Tulsa.

R. D. "Bob" Nabholz founded Nabholz Construction in Conway in 1949. It currently employs over 800 people and has been listed by Engineering News-Record (ENR) magazine as one of the Top 400 General Contractors every year since 1986. Currently, the company is ranked #161. Conway Corporation handles the local utilities (cable TV, Internet, and telephone services, in addition to electricity and water) for the city of Conway.

Acxiom Corporation, an interactive marketing services company, was founded in 1969 in Conway.

On June 19, 2008, Hewlett-Packard announced it would be opening a 150,000-square-foot (14,000 m²) facility with 1,200 employees in 2009. The building, built by Nabholz Construction and located in the Meadows Office and Technology Park, has since been abandoned by HP and is now leased to Gainwell Technologies.

On December 16, 2021, Arkansas-based company Westrock Coffee announced the planned opening of a new plant in Conway. The company purchased a 524,000-square-foot (48,700 m²) facility that is expected to create 250 jobs.

Top employers Updated March 2016 1 Acxiom; 2 University of Central Arkansas; 3 Conway Regional Health System; 4 Conway Human Development Center; 5 Conway Public School District; 6 DXC Technology; 7 Wal-Mart; 8 Kimberly-Clark Corporation; 9 Southwestern Energy Company Natural Gas; 10 Virco Manufacturing; 11 Snap-on; 12 Nabholz Companies; 13 City of Conway; 14 Kroger; 15 Home BancShares; 16 Hendrix College.

**College and Universities ** Conway is home to three institutions of higher learning, earning it the nickname City of Colleges. The University of Central Arkansas is a public research university with an enrollment of approximately 12,000 students. It is well known for its Norbert O. Schedler Honors College, being one of the first and most-modeled-after honor colleges in the United States. Hendrix College is a nationally recognised private liberal arts college with an enrollment just over 1,300 students. With an average composite ACT score of 29, it is the highest of any college in the state. Central Baptist College is a four-year private liberal arts college with an enrollment of nearly 900 students. These colleges together contribute to over 40 percent of Conway's adult workforce having a bachelor's degree or higher, making it one of the most educated cities in the state.