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The Sweet Sound of Generosity
Woman of the Year Nominee
by Ralph McGill Jr.
October 25, 2007
When octogenarian Dr. Bobbie Bailey heard someone describe her career and call her the
"Energizer Bunny," she laughed out loud. "I suppose it is true," she says. "I keep on going and
going and going and going..."
It would take a lot of energy to have one of the careers that Bailey has had, much less all
of them. Her resume is full: auto mechanic, machine operator, CEO of a national company, polar
adventurer, entertainment executive, record and television producer, manager of a women's athletic
team, and significant philanthropic contributor to music, the arts, medicine and athletics.
Her most recent activity has been as a philanthropist. Kennesaw State University just
dedicated the Dr. Bobbie Bailey and Family Performance Center, which houses a 630-seat concert hall
and a 3,600- square-foot music rehearsal hall. In addition, a new Steinway concert grand piano was
installed in memory of her mother.
The ability to donate so generously shows just how far she has come from her hardscrabble
roots. The third of eight children, Bailey moved to Atlanta when she was 10 years old. It was the
Depression, and money was tight. Everyone was expected to help. "My dad was disabled, having gone
down a well on a rope to save a fellow worker and fell over 50 feet to the bottom of the well. He
was unable to walk but refused to give up. He did what he could by dragging himself along doing odd
chores."
Her brother, Leon, was a master mechanic and made his own tools. A self-described tomboy,
Bailey hung out at the track watching him race souped-up dirt track cars at Lakewood Fairgrounds.
He taught her about rods, pistons and rings, and her desire to copy him paid off when she
discovered a mechanical gift that would shape the rest of her life. These talents came in handy
when she needed a summer job.
World War II was raging and, at 15, she was too young for work that was deemed "essential" to
the war effort. Still, she wanted to help out and answered an ad in the paper, "Refrigeration work,
essential." With "essential" being the key word, she got a job with the Orr Brothers machine shop
working on burned-out refrigeration compressors. Bailey stayed on after the war, working full time
and attending night school.
"Money continued to be tight," Bailey recalls. "And one dark day we found ourselves two
months behind on our rent, and I simply did not know what to do. I was crying on the trolley and a
kind lady came up to me and asked what was wrong. She loaned me the money to keep us in our home
and did not ask any favor." Bailey knew she couldn't repay that kindness, but "I was going to get
in the position to try."
She did. In 1948, with one of the Orr brothers, she started the Our-Way Machine Shop. Bailey
became CEO in 1952. Later, she organized a new company, Our-Way Inc., specializing in the
remanufacturing of commercial refrigeration and air conditioning compressors.
As the air conditioning industry grew, Bailey took on larger and larger contracts from all
the big boys like Carrier. By 1978, Our-Way had outgrown its Elizabeth Street location and moved to
a 226,000- square-foot building in Tucker. From that startup business, Bailey had grown Our-Way to
become the world's largest independent remanufacturer of commercial air conditioning and
refrigeration compressors, employing more than 350 people with annual sales of more than $45
million.
In 2001, Bailey, who had served as CEO and sole owner for more than 50 years, sold her
business to Carrier Corp. and with this sale, secured jobs for her loyal 350-plus employees. Some
Energizer Bunny.
But that business career merely scratched the surface of her life and story. A sports lover,
she managed the Lorelei Ladies fast-pitch softball team for 20 years. This all-women's team played
throughout the country, winning several consecutive national championships. When she retired from
the team, she established women's athletic scholarships at KSU and endowed a new athletic facility
named the Bobbie Bailey Athletic Complex, which was dedicated in 2005.
Her adventurous spirit also led her, as part of the Greenland Expedition Society, to sponsor,
promote and help in the engineering of the recovery of the "Lost Squadron" WWII warplanes buried
250 feet below the polar ice cap. "I even designed the equipment that bored down to the airplane
and melted the ice," Bailey says. "It was quite an adventure."
Like her mother and grandmother, she loved music, and Bailey became a member of the Recording
Academy in 1972. Since that time she has served several terms as governor of the Atlanta chapter
and two terms as the chapter's president, as well as filling other leadership roles in the music
industry. "I could never play an instrument or sing a lick, but I was elected to the Georgia Music
Hall of Fame for working behind the scenes," Bailey says. "I just know how to get things done."
But her musical interests don't stop there. She produces records on her own RX-Melody and
Southernaire labels. Her first RX-Melody release was an album commemorating the 25th anniversary of
the singing group the Platters, and she produced the accompanying television special. Bailey and
entertainment lawyer Joel Katz have a joint venture, Oryx Music Publishers.
Like Kennesaw State, Georgia State University has also benefited. There is the Bobbie Bailey
Music Industry scholarship and the Bobbie Bailey Professor in Music, which enable instructors and
music industry students to travel to music industry conferences. And the Bobbie Bailey Music
Technology and Recording Classrooms allow students to study the latest music software at 18
computer/keyboard stations.
Her generosity is also evident at DeKalb Medical Center, where the Mary and Elbert Bailey
Family Emergency Waiting Room was dedicated in memory of her parents, and the M. Bobbie Bailey and
Audrey B. Morgan Diagnostic Imaging Center was dedicated to further diagnostic cancer services
through a state-of-the-art PET/CT scanner. "I had a loved one who might have lived if he had access
to the kind of imaging machines they have now and had received a more accurate diagnosis," Bailey
recalls, adding, "Most of my philanthropic work has a personal side to it."
"This community has never failed to give me the opportunity to succeed. I feel it is only
right that I do what I can to help pay back for all the kindness I have received throughout my
life," she says. And, just like the Energizer Bunny, Bailey intends to keep on going. She plans to
do a bit of traveling – something she has not had much time for in the last 70 years or so. "I will
probably fly – I have my own plane out at Peachtree DeKalb. I am not a cruise person. Unless the
water is shallow enough to wade ashore."
