The story
The business was founded by Tim Horton (1930–1974), a Canadian hockey player. The chain's first store opened on May 17, 1964, in Hamilton, Ontario, under the name Tim Horton Donuts; the name was later abbreviated to Tim Horton's and then, in 1993, changed to Tim Hortons without the possessive apostrophe, to better fit the French-speaking market in Québec.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.