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James Ross Mellon | |
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| Born | 1942 (age 82–83) |
| Citizenship | British Overseas Territories citizen |
| Alma mater | Yale University |
| Occupation(s) | Author, Safarist |
| Spouse | Vivian Rusch |
| Father | Matthew T. Mellon |
| Relatives | William Mellon (grandfather) Karl Negley Mellon (brother) Matthew Mellon (nephew) Christopher Mellon (nephew) |
James Ross Mellon (born 1942), variously known as "Jay" and "Jamie", is an author and safarist. He is a member of the Mellon family and has been called the patriarch of the branch of the family descended from William Larimer Mellon Sr. Born in the United States to Matthew and Gertrude Mellon, he later renounced his American citizenship and became a British Overseas Territories citizen while taking up residence in Monaco.
James Mellon is the second son of Matthew T. Mellon and Gertrude Mellon. According to Mellon family chronicler David Koskoff, he has a different personality from his late brother, Karl. [1] He attended St. Paul's School and graduated from Yale University. [1]
According to Koskoff, James became fascinated with guns at an early age. [1] He was an accomplished big game hunter who undertook a number of safaris, writing a book African Hunter about hunting in Africa generally, and his hunts specifically. [2] In 1969, he moved to Delhi, India, which he used as a jumping off point to undertake exotic animal hunts across India, Afghanistan, Nepal, Mongolia, Iran, Pakistan, and Thailand. [3]
Mellon renounced his United States citizenship in 1977 and took up residence in Monaco, while maintaining a penthouse in New York City. [4] He is a British Overseas Territories citizen. [5]
A second edition of African Hunter, published in the 1980s, was sold exclusively by Abercrombie & Fitch. [6] In 2011, Mellon authored a biography of Thomas Mellon, The Judge: A Life of Thomas Mellon, Founder of a Fortune. [7]
By the early 2000s, James was being referred to as the patriarch of the Mellon family. [8] [9]
Mellon was named in the Offshore Leaks files released by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) in 2013. According to the ICIJ, he "used four companies in the BVI [British Virgin Islands] and Liechtenstein to trade securities and transfer tens of millions of dollars among offshore bank accounts he controlled... He often used third parties' names as directors and shareholders of his companies rather than his own". [10]
In the 2020s, he unsuccessfully fought a claim of tax delinquency brought against him by the IRS, arguing he had no tax obligation to the United States due to his primarily foreign residency and citizenship; according to James, his American home was occupied exclusively by wife Vivian, the pair living "interesting, separate lives". [4]
In 1985, Mellon married Hans Ruesch's daughter, Vivian, in a ceremony in Italy. [11] He was, at the time, described by society columnist Aileen Mehle as having been "at the top of the hit parade of most eligible bachelors for years". [11]
According to Koskoff, he was a father figure to his nephew, Christopher Mellon, who was estranged from his own father, Karl — James's brother. [1]
At places the book seems almost a caricature of great-white-hunter literature, and Jay himself comes across as a hard-living adventurer. Like so many Mellons,Jay has a powerful nostalgia for the good old days - in his case, days of long before his birth in 1942. In his book he mourns the passing of the huge European-owned estates in Kenya ... [p. 521]
Jay was educated at St. Paul's and Yale ... From his earliest days, Jay was absorbed with guns and hunting. [p. 524]
No two brothers could be less alike than Jay and his older brother, Karl, unless it were their father Matthew, and Matthew's brother, Larry. Jay represents the traditions of yesterday's English upper class ... He sees relatively little of his brother, Karl, but takes a fatherly interest in Karl's oldest son, Christopher, twenty as of this writing. [p. 526]
Karl has been mostly separated from his four children ... He scarcely knew his son Christopher until Christopher became a student at nearby Colby College ...[p. 528]
Uncle Jay took him [Christopher] hunting at Rolling Rock... He gets along well with the people at Mellon Bank who administer a small trust that Matthew established for him, though when he asked them if he could have a car his request was answered not by the bankers but by a stern letter from his Uncle Jay about extravagance. He has not read any of the family writings other than Matthew's books and Jay's African Hunter.[p. 564]
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