Born in Kilkenny Ireland in 1855, James Butler emigrated to the US when he was twenty. Saving some money working in the hotel trade, he was able to co-open a grocery with the son of his landlady. This first store on Second Avenue would be the seed for one of the first great retail grocery chains and an immense fortune.

Buying his co-owner out, Butler modestly named the store after himself and began to expand. Opening store after store, Butler ensured that they were all run in the same meticulous way and soon they started creating a substantial profit. Moreover, all of them were in New York, Butler claiming "it did not occur to him at that time that he might also extend his business to other cities." Whether this is true or not, eventually, Butler happily expanded outside of the city, building stores in Cleveland, Cincinnati, St. Louis.

The Butler stores (and indeed all groceries) differed from today's grocers. Customers would come to a front counter and request food and goods. Clerks would then weigh out the varying amounts while the customers waited. This meant running an efficient grocery involved a large number of logistics and active management.

By 1907, a profile on Butler stated that he owned 178 stores in New York City alone as well as substantial parts of other grocery companies throughout the country. Moreover, Butler had invested heavily in real estate with the practice of always buying the corner buildings where his stores stood. Needless to say, Butler had become an extremely wealthy man.

With his wealth estimated at 30,000,000 at his death in 1934, Butler was not one to indulge himself. Denouncing golf as a "rich man's game," and eschewing society, his pleasures came from the habits that would earn him the nickname "Squire Butler." He bought an estate in Tarrytown and trotter horses. Notoriously cheap, he supposedly built the Empire City racetrack in Yonkers because he didn't want to pay the cost of transporting his horses to Belmont. He claimed to not be interested in races only the profits of the racetrack. However, Butler revealed a love for horses, having his company's retired delivery horses live on his estate.

The horses were not the limit of his charitable endeavors, Butler gave considerably to Catholic institutions. With his cousin, Mother Marie Joseph Butler, a nun, Butler founded the (now defunct) Marymount College in Tarrytown as the land on Fifth Avenue for the Marymount School. He helped fund the Sacred Heart Convent and St. Patrick's Cathedral. His considerable donations to the Catholic Church caused Pope Gregory made him a Knight Commander of the Order of Saint Gregory. However, James Butler, perhaps content with his name on stores throughout the country, would refer to himself as the "Egg and Butter man."

Nevertheless, Butler was never one to lose track of his business interests, tirelessly managing and delegating. It was once said that “Wake him up in the middle of the night and he can tell you just what he is worth at that particular moment.” However, James Butler Jr., Butler's son, was more interested in horse racing than running a grocery empire.

When Butler Jr. became president in 1935 following his father's death, he was ill-equipped to manage the trials of the great depression and increased competition. The company reorganized and then filed for bankruptcy. At one point, it had been the second-largest grocery chain in America, second only to the great A\&P, by 1940, there was only one lone store on Douglaston Parkway. In October of that year, James Butler Jr. was thrown from a horse and killed. However, the green awnings survive in these photos and the Empire City Race Track survives to this day.