James Girvin Peters was born on November 14, 1876, in Baltimore, Maryland to Winfield Peters and Mary Girvin. His father was a Confederate veteran who worked as a bookkeeper after the war. Peters grew up and attended school in Baltimore before graduating from Johns Hopkins University in 1900.

 

He attended the Forest School at Yale University in the early 1900s, and he began working as a forest assistant with the United States Forest Service in 1903. In 1908, he became a forest examiner, and in 1911, he became chief of state cooperation. He was a member of the Protestant Episcopal church, and he supported the Democratic Party. As he explained, “I am for regulated competition as against legalized monopoly, publicity as against star chamber deals, conservation in all things, woman’s suffrage…and any progressive measure which is constructive.”

 

He married Harriet Dugan White on November 12, 1907, and they had two children: Horace, born on September 3, 1908; and James, born on May 18, 1911. He died of a heart attack in Camden, Arkansas, on October 9, 1928, while attending a meeting of the Southern Chamber of Commerce.

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