John Brisben Walker

John Brisben Walker (September 10, 1847 – July 7, 1931) was a magazine publisher and automobile entrepreneur in the United States. In his later years, he was a resident of Jefferson County, Colorado. Biography Walker was born on September 10, 1847, at his parents' country house on the Monongahela River, near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In 1872, Walker arrived in Charleston, West Virginia and purchased much land from the Elk river west to a line which ran from the Kanawha river near the end of the present Delaware Avenue to about the end of Fayette Street at West Washington Street, and extending from the Kanawha river to he present West Washington street. This he designated as the J.B. Walker addition to the City of Charleston, but it was commonly called the West End. Walker laid off this section into a town site, with streets running in one direction and avenues in another. He named the streets for West Virginia counties, and the avenues for other states. His original plans, with a few changes in names, but little other variation, are still the plans of that part of the city. Walker's land failed to make a profit, and so he moved to New York to try his hand at another venture. In 1889 he purchased Cosmopolitan Magazine, leading it to marked growth before selling it to William Randolph Hearst in 1905. The 1905 sale price has been variously reported as $400,000 and $1,000,000. He was a co-founder of the Locomobile Company of America and established the Mobile Company of America in 1899.