Peter Buck provided the $1,000 loan that helped Fred DeLuca open the first Subway sandwich shop.
DeLuca wanted to earn money for medical school, and Buck, a family friend with a doctorate in nuclear physics, suggested opening a submarine-sandwich business. Buck supplied the initial loan in 1965, and the first shop opened in Bridgeport, Connecticut, under the name Pete’s Super Submarines.
The business later became Subway, and DeLuca and Buck remained closely associated with its growth. The founders’ partnership is sometimes oversimplified as a conventional restaurant-company origin story, but the initial financing came from Buck personally rather than from a large food corporation.
Subway’s early expansion relied heavily on franchising. That approach allowed the chain to grow rapidly with independently operated restaurants, making it one of the world’s most geographically widespread sandwich franchises.