Roy Arthur Hunt was born on August 3, 1881 in Nashua, New Hampshire. He was the only child of Alfred Epher Hunt and Maria Tyler McQuesten.

Soon after Roy's birth, Alfred moved his son and wife to Pittsburgh where he had taken a position at Park, Brother & Company, a steel-making concern. A graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Alfred had been in charge of the chemical and metallurgical work in the open hearth department of the Nashua Iron and Steel Company. In 1883, Alfred resigned from Park, Brother & Company, and together with George H. Clapp established an independent laboratory and consulting business. They began working for Pittsburgh Testing Laboratory, a pioneer in the analysis and mechanical testing of steel, and in 1887 acquired it. It was there that they recognized the merits of a new and inexpensive process being developed by Charles Martin Hall to separate aluminum from its oxide.

Roy was only seven years old when his father Alfred and six other entrepreneurs met in the parlor of the Hunt home on Shady Lane to organize a company to produce aluminum. They purchased Hall's patents and organized the Pittsburgh Reduction Company.

The business later became known as the Aluminum Company of America (Alcoa), but not before Alfred's untimely death in April of 1899 of complications from malaria, which he had contracted the year before in Puerto Rico while serving as a Captain in the Cavalry during the Spanish-American War.

Roy was eighteen when his father died, an event that deepened his resolve to get a good education, a tradition in the Hunt family for generations past. Roy was finishing his third year at Yale when he wrote to Arthur Vining Davis, then general manager of the aluminum company. Davis had been hired 14 years before by Captain Hunt as the company's first employee. Dated May 25, 1902, Roy's letter said: "As it is drawing toward the close of the college year and we talked over my trying to work this summer if I could get the job, I write to inquire if anything has turned up. It does not matter what it is, from digging a hole to emptying paper baskets. Also the location is immaterial, from the suburbs to the smallest hamlet in Canada to the center of a city."

Davis put Roy to work as a machinist's helper in the New Kensington plant. After graduating from college in 1903, Roy became a mill clerk at the company's New Kensington plant. This began Roy's lifetime career with Alcoa.

By 1907, when the company changed its name to Alcoa, Roy had worked his way up to Assistant Superintendent. A year later, he became Superintendent. In 1914, Charles Martin Hall died, and Roy took his place on Alcoa's Board of Directors. By then, Roy was General Superintendent of the company's fabricating plants, where he helped accelerate production of aluminum for the war. In 1918, Roy was promoted to Vice President of both the fabricating and the smelting plants. Ten years later, in 1928, Roy was elected President of Alcoa. He served in that position until 1951 when he was named Chairman of the Executive Committee, a position he held until 1963. Roy remained a member of the Alcoa Board of Directors until his death on October 21, 1966.

In 1961, Roy and his wife Rachel founded the Hunt Botanical Library at Carnegie Mellon University (now the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation). Rachel's library formed the basis of the Institute's collection, and Roy's financial contribution allowed for the construction of the University's central library where the Hunt Institute is still housed.

Roy was patriotic and intensely interested in the welfare of the country. He never failed to speak out for the cause of liberty. At a Tri-State Industrial Association dinner, he said (quoting an unknown source), "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty, never purchased by a fulfilled contract, but always on a pay-as-you-go basis." He was also a great believer in free enterprise and fair competition.

Roy was self-effacing and had a deep-seated sense of humor. Unlike most businessmen, he never took time for hobbies or spectator sports. His chief interest outside the company was his family. He did, however, enjoy the arts, especially music. His artistic judgements were strictly his own. "I like what I like, and I'm going to keep on liking it," he said. "I'm not going to be regimented."

Roy was also a director of Mellon National Bank and Trust Company, the National Union Fire Insurance Company, and Pittsburgh Testing Laboratory. He held honorary degrees from the University of Pittsburgh, Oberlin College, and Grove City College. He was a trustee of Magee Women's Hospital, the Pittsburgh Skin and Cancer Foundation, Grove City College, Carnegie Institute of Technology, and Allegheny Cemetery.