Nanini, Bill
William M. "Bill" Nanini (1912-2009) was the "father of Tucson National" and the man largely responsible for introducing households nationwide to the desert Southwest in living color during the 1960s. He was the son of Sam Nanini.
Nanini built the 27-hole championship golf course - now Omni Tucson National Golf Resort - and subdivision on 365 acres of northwest- side cotton fields he bought from his father, Sam, in the late 1950s.
"That was my dad's baby, the thing he was most proud of," said son Steve Nanini.
The course opened in 1960 and, three years later, staged its first big tourney - the Dean Martin Tucson Open. The sporting event served as an hours-long commercial for the Old Pueblo.
"It was televised on NBC and brought national attention and great exposure to Tucson," Bill Nanini said in a 2001 Arizona Daily Star article. "I think between that publicity and all of the development that my family has been involved in, we have really helped the growth of Tucson."
Nanini was lured to Southern Arizona after his parents, Sam and Giaconda Nanini, retired to Tucson.
Sam Nanini started the Rock Road Construction Company and Bill Nanini took over the company when his father retired. But, by the late 1950s, he had grown weary of working in the "Windy City."
"I told my dad I was tired of the construction business in Chicago, tired of the politics and the unions. I told him I wanted to build a golf course," Bill Nanini said in a 2002 Arizona Daily Star article.
He moved to Tucson, where the elder Nanini had been buying up desert parcels.
Sam Nanini, who died in 1978, developed the Casas Adobes Plaza Shopping Center and Casas Adobes Estates and other large tracts of northwest-side desert.
Bill Nanini lost the golf resort in a bankruptcy reorganization during the recession of the late 1980s. He retired around the same time, turning over operation of the family holdings to his son, Steve. At one point, the family owned 11 businesses, including construction, investment, development and property-management companies.
Bill Nanini also was a philanthropist, donating land for community projects, including the Nanini Branch Library on North Shannon Road near West Ina Road, named in honor of his parents.
"He did some phenomenal things in his lifetime and so did my grandfather," Steve Nanini said.
In addition to his son, Bill Nanini is survived by his daughters, Sandy and Toni.
