James J. Ward, III was born in Washington, D.C. in 1946. He attended the US Page School in Washington D.C. under Congressman George Fallow from 1961 to 1963, and graduated from Calvert Hall High School in Baltimore, Maryland in 1965. He earned a B.S. in Business and a B.A. in Accounting at Loyola College in Baltimore.

Mr. Ward began his career at JE Greiner Company as an assistant comptroller. By 1976, he had formed the Ward Development Company (based in Baltimore), and began with renovating over 150 townhouses downtown. In 1978, he purchased the Roland Park Shopping Center and extensively renovated and restored the building, which was originally constructed in 1907. Roland Park Shopping Center is the first planned shopping center in the country and is still owned and managed by the Ward family, housing one of the most popular and exquisite Foreman Wolf restaurants in Baltimore, “Petite Louis”.

Another of his projects was converting an old convent, Visitation Academy, into 20 condos and 50 townhouses, known as Roland Park North. Since 1976, Mr. Ward has developed over 2,000 acres into residential development and constructed over 1,500,000 SF of commercial development. At one point he owned many properties along York Road in Baltimore, with one newspaper article giving him the title “Lord of York”. These projects included Towson Commons and Belvedere Square.

Throughout his career, Mr. Ward has subdivided over 2,500 acres in Baltimore and Howard Counties. He has also placed over 1,200 acres into conservation under the Maryland Agricultural Trust program. Included is the 525 acre Sagamore Farm, which he purchased from Alfred Vanderbilt in 1988 and sold in 2009 to Kevin Plank of Under Amour.

In 1992 Mr. Ward began developing in South Florida building strip centers and sub divisions, most recently opening Village Green Shopping Center in Wellington, which is the home of one of the first Trader Joe’s in South Florida.

Mr. Ward enjoys golf and skiing in his spare time.