West Virginia Executive Spring 2017 | Page 96

Dave Arnold Senior Vice President Public Relations & Strategic Partnerships Adventures on the Gorge MAGGIE MATSKO Photo by Adventures on the Gorge. DAVE ARNOLD, senior vice president of public relations and strate- gic partnerships at Adventures on the Gorge, has had a great ap- preciation for the outdoors since he was a child. “Growing up in Cincinnati, I spent a lot of time on our family farm in Fayetteville, Ohio,” he says. “It’s an area known as the edge of Appalachia, so my entire life I feel I have had one foot in Appalachia and one foot out. This has had a lot to do with who I have become.” Arnold grew up in a family of entrepreneurs, believing there was no difference between work, play and family. It was his 94 WEST VIRGINIA EXECUTIVE grandfather who fueled Arnold’s passion for the outdoors while teaching him important lessons about business. “My grandfa- ther was my top mentor,” he says. “He owned a trucking com- pany that grew to be one of the top 100 trucking companies in America, and after 40 years, it went bankrupt. The lessons I learned by growing up with this rise and fall, along with all the conversations we had later in life, affect me every day.” Arnold followed his passion for the outdoors to another town called Fayetteville, this time in West Virginia. There, he began