Lewis Rudolph, a Krispy Kreme founder, dies
William Lewis Rudolph was a teenager when he joined his family’s emerging doughnut business during the Great Depression and helped open Nashville’s first Krispy Kreme shop.
Mr. Rudolph, who went by Lewis, began working at the Charlotte Pike store with his father, sister and two brothers in the mid-1930s, and over the years he helped build the Krispy Kreme Doughnut Corp., that has delighted consumers for decades and become an icon of Southern fare. He died Sunday at age 95.
Mr. Rudolph grew up on a farm near Paducah, Ky., where his father, Plumie Rudolph, ran a general store. Based on family records, his uncle, Ishmael Armstrong, and his brother, Vernon Rudolph, then 18, began making and selling yeast-raised doughnuts, following a recipe from a New Orleans chef. Both the doughnut business and the general store struggled amid the economic downturn and they sought opportunities in Nashville, with Plumie Rudolph eventually buying the doughnut operation from Armstrong.
Mr. Rudolph quit high school to work at the doughnut shop, mixing ingredients in a bowl by hand. The doughnut shop did well enough to expand to Charleston, W.Va., and Atlanta, and in 1937, Vernon Rudolph established the doughnut brand in Winston-Salem, N.C., inspired by the success Camel cigarettes had there.
full: http://www.tennessean.com/story/money/2014/12/30/lewis-rudolph-krispy-kreme-founder-dies/21078879/