James Wilbur Allen

James attended St. Mary’s University where he earned his Bachelor’s Degree and went on to become a Certified Public Accountant. He left public accounting to become President of Mr. M Food Stores, where he took the company from 50 stores and 12 million dollars in sales to over 100 stores and 60 million in sales in 9 years. After that he became the Financial Advisor to Tom Benson, where he led the purchase of the New Orleans Saints and handled all planning for construction on the Super Dome, banks, dealerships designs and construction. He also came up with the idea of luxury box seats. He helped design, finance and supervise construction of 68 luxury box suites in the Super Dome.

The NFL was so impressed they offered him a very large salary to be the CFO for the NFL and move to New York. He declined the lucrative offer. He later was CFO for a large education company, CFO for another two large companies and then left that to help his son with his new company, J. Allen Investments, inc. (JAI) in 1997. His son started JAI in 1995 and when he joined JAI the growth went up tremendously. When he took over JAI he put together deals for retail shopping centers, self-storage facilities, land development, office buildings etc.

SOME OF HIS ACHIEVEMENTS:Certified Public AccountantFounding Director and President of the North San Antonio Chamber of CommerceChairman of the the San Antonio Industrial Development BoardChairman of the St. Mary’s Alumni AssociationU.S. Air ForceAmazing husband and father

He was preceded in death by his parents, Ruth and James Allen; and his brother in law, John R. Burns. James is survived by his wife of 64 years, Barbara; son, James Robert Allen; daughter, Gabrielle Allen; grand-daughters, Makayla A. Allen and Faith E. Allen; grand-sons, James R. Allen, Jr. and Christopher B Barrera; sister, Patricia Carroll and her husband Pat; sister-in-laws, Beverly J. Heinzmann and her husband Robert and Judy R. Burns; and numerous nieces and nephews.

In Lieu of flowers please consider a donation to the St. Jude Foundation or The Wounded Warrior Project.

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