Arthur W. Perdue (1885–1977) was an American businessman and the founder of

Perdue Farms Perdue Farms is the parent company of Perdue Foods and Perdue AgriBusiness, based in Salisbury, Maryland. Perdue Foods is a major chicken, turkey, and pork processing company in the United States. Perdue AgriBusiness ranks among the top United S ...

along with his wife Pearl in 1920. The business was started in his backyard, and at the time only produced table eggs from chickens, but eventually grew into a $4.1 billion company.

Family and background

In the 1600s, Henri Perdue, a

Huguenot The Huguenots ( , also , ) were a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed, or Calvinist, tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, the Genevan burgomaster Be ...

, left France for the

Province of Maryland The Province of Maryland was an English and later British colony in North America that existed from 1632 until 1776, when it joined the other twelve of the Thirteen Colonies in rebellion against Great Britain and became the U.S. state of Maryland ...

to escape religious persecution. Perdue settled in what is now Wicomico and Worcester Counties and his descendents continue to live in the area. Perdue was born in 1885 as the second of three children to Levin and Martha Perdue in Worcester County. His parents were devout and strict Methodists. He married Pearl Parsons in 1917 and had one child in 1920,

Frank Perdue Franklin Parsons Perdue (May 9, 1920 – March 31, 2005), born in Salisbury, Maryland, was for many years the president and CEO of Perdue Farms, now one of the largest chicken-producing companies in the United States. Background Frank was ...

Career

In 1915, Arthur Perdue worked as a Railway Express agent in

Salisbury, Maryland Salisbury () is a city in and the county seat of Wicomico County, Maryland, Wicomico County, Maryland, United States, and the largest city in Eastern Shore of Maryland, the state's Eastern Shore region. The population was 33,050 at the 2020 United ...

. By 1920, Perdue noticed that the chicken farmers on the

Delmarva peninsula The Delmarva Peninsula, or simply Delmarva, is a large peninsula and proposed state on the East Coast of the United States, occupied by the vast majority of the state of Delaware and parts of the Eastern Shore regions of Maryland and Virginia ...

that were making money had shifted from selling chickens to selling table eggs. Perdue quit his job at the railroad and established his own commercial table-egg farm a few miles east of

. Perdue began focusing on quality and brought in Leghorn breeding stock from Texas to improve the quality of his flock. He then expanded his egg market, including to

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

Legacy

The

Arthur W. Perdue Stadium Arthur W. Perdue Stadium is a baseball stadium in Salisbury, Maryland. It is the home of the Baltimore Orioles Carolina League affiliate Delmarva Shorebirds. Named for the founder of Perdue Farms, Arthur Perdue, it features the Maryland Eastern ...

, is home to the

Delmarva Shorebirds The Delmarva Shorebirds are a Minor League Baseball team based in Salisbury, Maryland. They are members of the Carolina League and the Single-A affiliate of the Baltimore Orioles. Their home games are played at Arthur W. Perdue Stadium. The Shore ...

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

team, a class A affiliate of the

Baltimore Orioles The Baltimore Orioles are an American professional baseball team based in Baltimore. The Orioles compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) American League East, East division. As one of the American L ...

in the

South Atlantic League The South Atlantic League, often informally called the Sally League, is a Minor League Baseball league with teams predominantly in states along the Atlantic coast of the United States from New York to Georgia. A Class A league for most of its ...

. The Franklin P. and Arthur W. Perdue Foundation was established to support the communities where

has facilities. In 2017, the farmhouse Perdue built in 1917 and lived in was added to the

Maryland Inventory of Historic Properties The Maryland Historical Trust is an agency of Maryland Department of Planning and serves as the Maryland State Historic Preservation Office. The agency serves to assist in research, conservation, and education, of Maryland's historical and cultura ...

Family and background

Career

Legacy

References

Further reading