James Walker Tufts (February 11, 1835 – February 3, 1902) is known for his founding of

Pinehurst, North Carolina Pinehurst is a village in Moore County, North Carolina, United States. As of the 2010 census, the village population was 13,124. It is home of the historic Pinehurst Resort, a Golf resort, which has hosted multiple United States Open Champion ...

and for his development of a successful business in

silver plate Plating is a surface covering in which a metal is deposited on a conductive surface. Plating has been done for hundreds of years; it is also critical for modern technology. Plating is used to decorate objects, for corrosion inhibition, to impro ...

tableware. He also founded the Arctic Soda Fountain Co. and eventually merged with A. D. Puffer & Sons ( Boston, Massachusetts), John Matthews (

New York City, New York New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

), and Charles Lippincott (

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

) to form the

American Soda Fountain Co American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

. Tufts was the inventor of the Arctic Soda Fountain and was installed as the first president of the merger that formed American Soda Fountain.

Biography

Tufts was born in

Charlestown, Massachusetts Charlestown is the oldest neighborhood in Boston, Massachusetts, in the United States. Originally called Mishawum by the Massachusett tribe, it is located on a peninsula north of the Charles River, across from downtown Boston, and also adjoins t ...

on February 11, 1835, to Leonard Tufts and Hepzebah Fosdick Tufts. He was "an entrepreneur, inventor, and philanthropist. He rose from being a sixteen-year-old drug store apprentice to becoming a wealthy businessman who had the vision and determination to build Pinehurst, in only six months." In 1895, Tufts initially purchased , and eventually purchased an additional , of land for approximately $1.25 per acre in the North Carolina Sandhills, with the vision of building a "health resort for people of modest means". Originally dubbed "Tuftstown" during development, Tuftstown became the village of Pinehurst, and home of the

Pinehurst Resort Pinehurst Resort is a golf resort in Pinehurst, North Carolina in the United States. It has hosted a number of prestigious golf tournaments including three U.S. Open Championships, one U.S. Women's Open, three U.S. Amateur Championships, one ...

—the name was chosen from a list of losing names proposed for

Oak Bluffs Oak Bluffs is a town located on the island of Martha's Vineyard in Dukes County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 5,341 at the 2020 United States Census. It is one of the island's principal points of arrival for summer tourists ...

on Martha's Vineyard, formerly known as Cottage City. James Walker Tufts was a prominent summer resident of Cottage City. Tufts hired the landscape architecture firm started by

Frederick Law Olmsted Frederick Law Olmsted (April 26, 1822August 28, 1903) was an American landscape architect, journalist, social critic, and public administrator. He is considered to be the father of landscape architecture in the USA. Olmsted was famous for co- ...

to do the initial city planning; because his health was failing, Olmsted himself was unable to play an active role. Pinehurst later became known for its golf courses with the arrival of golf pro Donald Ross (originally of Dornoch, Scotland) in December, 1900. Ross designed four of Pinehurst's golf courses. Tufts died in Pinehurst on February 2, 1902. Pinehurst was controlled by the Tufts family until 1970. James Tufts's son

Leonard Leonard or ''Leo'' is a common English masculine given name and a surname. The given name and surname originate from the Old High German ''Leonhard'' containing the prefix ''levon'' ("lion") from the Greek Λέων ("lion") through the Latin '' L ...

, and his grandson,

Richard Richard is a male given name. It originates, via Old French, from Frankish language, Old Frankish and is a Compound (linguistics), compound of the words descending from Proto-Germanic language, Proto-Germanic ''*rīk-'' 'ruler, leader, king' an ...

, succeeded him.

References

External links

Pinehurst Resort -- Significance Onto Itself
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Tufts, James Walker 1835 births 1902 deaths Tufts family 19th-century American businesspeople People from Pinehurst, North Carolina