When Floyd Bean arrived in Dallas 40 years ago, the Galveston native and Southern University graduate was confident that he would someday own a business and that he would not be in Dallas more than five years. After several years as a traveling salesman, based in Dallas, he landed a position as Director of Minority Franchises for Bonanza Steakhouse.
This position also required him to travel extensively, but he now was a family man and he leaped at the opportunity to become the first Black owner of a Bonanza franchise in Texas in 1972.