Walton is the founder and chairman of Rappahannock Ventures LLC, a private equity firm, and Rush River Entertainment, the feature-film production company behind The Price of Desire (2015), The Ticket (2015), and Max Rose (2013). He is the host of the webcast On Common Ground with Bill Walton, which focuses on how entrepreneurship and innovation are economic and moral imperatives for a thriving America. He is also a partner in The Forge Studios, an independent film studio in Washington, VA, which creates short films and provides film production training for artists and crew. Additionally, through Rappahannock Media LLC, he publishes The Rappahannock News, the Culpeper Times, and The Piedmont VirginianMagazine.
Walton was chairman of the investment banking firm Allied Capital Corporation for 12 years. Prior to that, he worked for Butler Capital Corporation, the merger and acquisition group of Lehman Brothers Kuhn Loeb, and the Continental Illinois Bank. He was also the personal investment advisor to William S. Paley, founder of CBS.
He is involved with a number of non-profit groups that focus on public policy, the arts, and his local community. He is vice president of the Council for National Policy, a member of the board of the Media Research Center, and a senior fellow for the Discovery Institute’s Center on Wealth, Poverty, and Morality. He is president of the Washington Volunteer Fire and Rescue Company and a board member of the Northern Piedmont Community Foundation. He previously served as president of the National Symphony Orchestra, a member of the collectors committee and trustees’ council of the National Gallery of Art, treasurer of the Wolf Trap Center for the Arts, and a member of the board of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
Walton served in the U.S. Army as a specialist at the Pentagon before earning his bachelor of science degree at Indiana University. He paid the tuition for his MBA from IU’s Kelley School of Business by working as an accounting instructor. He is a life member of MENSA and the NRA.
