James F. Pfeufer was born in Comfort, TX in 1912. His grandparents were members of the German Freethinker movement who settled the area around 1848. He was raised in Harlem, NY, where he became an artist, scholar and clarinetist. He was high school class valedictorian, and attended City College of New York. 

A lifelong teacher and artist, he was the president of the Boston Writers’ and Artists’ Union under the Works Projects Administration in the 1930’s. During WW II he designed the first easy-to-understand instruction manuals for the use of radar equipment for the US Navy. He taught shop at Shady Hill School in Cambridge, developed the glass designer training program for Steuben Glass in Corning, NY, and later was head of the Department of Graphic Design at Rhode Island School of Design. He was Art Director for Pilgrim Press/United Church during the 1960’s and subsequently had his own design company in Boston. 

An outspoken liberal, he marched in Washington DC in the 1930’s for Social Security, and against Nazi anti-Semitism before the outbreak of WW II. At Pilgrim Press in the 1960’s, he supported the publication of works by liberation theologians and antiwar activists including the Berrigan brothers, Harvey Cox, and Sister Corita. His book “The Movement Toward a New America,” a collage of writings about the ongoing American revolution by Goodman, received an AIGA 50 Best Books Award in 1970. 

When he retired to the Cape in 1977 at age 65, he became the art director at the Cape Cod Conservatory in West Barnstable, and he taught printmaking and lithography there and at the Cape Cod Regional Technical High School in Harwich. He was also active in the conception of the Cape Museum of Fine Arts. 

In his life he provided support and inspiration for artists, writers, thinkers, philosophers, poets, musicians, and students, and counted among his close personal friends several Nobel prize winners and numerous internationally known writers and artists. He was a gifted teacher who made himself accessible to all people and continued to evolve throughout his life.