In the beginning (1970 in this case), Jim Tupper was hatched at the Jersey Shore. He grew up in the booming metropolis of Brick, N.J. (hometown of the NHL's Jim Dowd) with his parents and four older siblings. For all intents and purposes, he had an utterly uneventful childhood. The teen years were also rather boring. Jim graduated from Brick Township Memorial High School in 1989, and mistakenly left Brick behind for a small enclave in the New Jersey Pine Barrens known as Elwood (a town that has actually jailed someone on "goat at large" charges - honest!). Amazingly, he survived that ordeal (living in Elwood that is - he wasn't the one who got jailed).
After spending his first two years as an Electrical Engineering major, Jim went with Plan B and earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology in 1993 at the college formerly known as Trenton State College (Now distinctly named The College of New Jersey --- I guess there are no others?). He followed that degree up with a Master of Arts in Psychology in 1996 from West Chester University in Pennsylvania. He may even be cruel enough to post his entire Master's Thesis, "The Self-Report Dissociative Disorders Interview Schedule: Reliability and Validity", on the internet someday, but the title alone is sadistic enough for now. Both degrees and the thesis are currently collecting dust. After finishing graduate school, Jim disappeared for a few years on a spiritual quest in Tibet.
But seriously, Jim lived briefly in Mercer County, New Jersey, home of the Trenton Titans, before making the trek out to Texas in 1996 as the result of an internet romance. Yes, do the math and you'll see that he bailed out on Jersey a few years before Trenton finally received its long heralded minor league hockey team. When the Titans were finally announced in 1998, the obsession known simply as The Unofficial Web Site was born. Jim currently lives in the suburbs of Dallas with his wonderful Sheltie named Shawnee. As for that internet romance, well it rebooted after 10 happy years (6 1/2 married).
Jim is currently self-employed as a champion thoroughbred armadillo breeder, but as a cover he pretends to be a Senior Database Engineer for Targetbase Marketing (An Omnicom Group Company), a CRM firm in Irving, Texas. In October of 1999, he started NJMystic Web Design, which still exists in theory, never having made a penny. On a more serious note, Jim also serves as a Planning and Zoning Commissioner for the City of Frisco and has participated in several area civic groups and programs. Jim hobbies include movies, sports (especially hockey, bet you never would have guessed that), chasing tumbleweed, and maintaining sanity in this mad mad world (maybe those Psychology degrees do come in handy after all). This is Jim's first major venture into the realm of web site design and management - so don't be too harsh!
Jim Tupper made his professional(1) hockey debut in the early '90s in the IFHL(2). He quickly emerged as a star(3) defenseman for the Slapheads. During the 1991/1992 season, Tupper led his team in goals by a defensman(4).
(1) Well, okay, there was nothing professional about the hockey he played.
(2) The Intramural Floor Hockey League.
(3) His teammates might beg to differ.
(4) Actually, all the defensemen were tied, unless one of them scored a goal that we don't remember.
Just for the record: The Slapheads were an actual intramural floor hockey team at Trenton State College and Jim Tupper did play defense. Their former team captain is now a high-ranking employee with a local ECHL team (I'll spare him the embarassment of listing his name).
After 29 years, Jim finally started to learn how to ice skate --- Look Out Gretzky! The ice skating lasted for a few dozen lunch breaks over the course of a few months before he tossed that one into the penalty box for the time being. However, that's not to say that Jim is busy perfecting the art of couch potatoism. At least not since April 5, 2004. For those of you who have met Jim or have looked closely at his photos on this site, he was a very big guy. To be brutally honest: 340 pounds at the start of 2004. All that changed on April 5th when he began a dramatic change in eating habits (balanced nutritional diet) and started working out with a physical trainer for an hour or more a day on 6 days a week (Diet and workout modeled after Body For Life). As of 04/23/05, Jim Tupper had lost 138 pounds!