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with Shackelton
Lipton's first store
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Sir Thomas Johnstone Lipton (1848 – 1931) was a Scotsman of Ulster-Scots parentage who was a self-made man, merchant, and yachtsman. He created the Lipton tea brand and was the most persistent challenger in the history of the America's Cup.
In 1864 Lipton signed up as a cabin boy on a steamer running between Glasgow and Belfast and was captivated by life aboard the ship and the stories told by sailors who had traveled to the United States. After being let go by the steamer company, Lipton quickly used the wages he had saved to purchase passage on a ship bound for the U.S. - where he would spend five years working and traveling all over the country. Lipton had a number of jobs during this time: at a tobacco plantation in Virginia, as an accountant and bookkeeper at a rice plantation in South Carolina, as a door-to-door salesman in New Orleans, a farmhand in New Jersey, and finally as a grocery assistant in New York. He returned to Glasgow in 1870, initially helping his parents run their small shop in the Gorbals. The following year he opened his first provision shop—Lipton's Market—at 101 Stobcross Street in the Anderston area of Glasgow. This enterprise proved to be successful and Lipton soon established a chain of groceries, first across Glasgow, the rest of Scotland, until finally he had stores throughout Britain. King Edward VII and King George V both shared their interest in yachting with Lipton and enjoyed his company. Between 1899 and 1930 he challenged the American holders of the America's Cup through the Royal Ulster Yacht Club five times with his yachts called Shamrock through Shamrock V. His well publicized efforts to win the cup, which earned him a specially designed cup for "the best of all losers", made his tea brand famous in the U.S. Sir Thomas was loved and respected for his sportsmanship as, one by one, all five of his SHAMROCKs were defeated. In the only close series, SHAMROCK IV took the first two races in 1920, but RESOLUTE came back to win the next three. His final challenge came in 1930 with SHAMROCK V, which lost in four straight races to ENTERPRISE, skippered by Harold Vanderbilt. Vanderbilt summed up the feelings of the American public when, after the last race, he said: "Uppermost in our minds is a feeling of sympathy for that grand old sportsman, Sir Thomas Lipton, with whom our relations have been so pleasant. This is perhaps his last attempt to lift the America's Cup. The ambition of a lifetime, to achieve which he has spent millions, is perhaps never to be realized. It has been our duty to shut the door in his face. In defeat lies the test of true sportsmanship, and he has proved to be a wonderful sportsman, quite the finest it has ever been our good fortune to race against." Although he was never able to win the Cup, the American people presented Sir Thomas with a gold cup in honor of his great sportsmanship. Shortly before his death at the age of 82, Sir Thomas was voted into membership in England's prestigious Royal Yacht Squadron. from Wikipedi and the Americas Cup Hall of Fame
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