LITTLE ROCK — It wouldn't be a surprise to find nothing underneath Nick and Ann Tillman's Christmas tree.
The Hot Springs couple, successful in their retail businesses, had other priorities.
Each year, they bought clothes and food for five needy families.
"That's our Christmas present to ourselves," Imy Marcus, a close friend of the couple, recalled Ann Tillman saying. "Well, my wife started crying."
That was about 10 years ago, and ever since, Marcus and his wife, Harriett, have given toys to the families, inspired by their friends' generosity.
The Tillmans, along with their friend and trusted pilot Greg Secrest, are believed to have died Monday in a fiery plane crash outside Nashville, Tenn. Investigators are using dental records to confirm the identities.
Nick Tillman, whose given name was Rodney, was 49. Ann, whose given first name was Rebecca, was 42.
Secrest, 67, of Hot Springs was piloting the couple in a twin-engine propeller plane to Tennessee on business. They were planning to visit two newly opened Earthbound Trading Co. stores, one of Nick Tillman's ventures.
The cause of the crash is under investigation.
Friends and family of the Tillmans said they were as aggressive in their charitable work as in their businesses, which included a boutique that Ann Tillman owned and operated, and an exotichome-decor store that her husband of 15 years ran.
They gave to Heifer International, and most recently Ann Tillman headed up a major fundraising effort for the First Step Foundation, which is associated with a center for the developmentally disabled, friends and family said.
She was chairman of the 2008 Designers Vision House to benefit the foundation and worked tirelessly for more than a year on the project, said Davis Tillman, her husband's oldest brother.
"She was evidently giving orders from the plane," he said. "If she wasn't the general, she was definitely the major."
The couple's oldest daughter Brittany, 13, has autism, which inspired Ann Tillman's charitable work.
The couple had two other daughters, Madison, 12, and Alayna, 8.
Friends described Nick Tillman as a globetrotter who trekked through villages of developing countries looking for handmade items to sell in his stores.
"He always had the idea for the fad for what was popular," said Tom Daniel, a Hot Springs businessman and City Council member. "That's what separated him."
But it was more than just the Tillmans' business sense that made an impression. It was also their genuine kindness, friends said.
"People like them, there's no way for them not to be successful," Daniel said. "When you saw them, you felt a warmness about you. You went 'Golly, those are nice people.'"
Arkansas, Pages 18 on 11/26/2008