John Price Jones

Background

John Price was born on August 12, 1877 in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, United States, the son of David F. Jones and Leah Price. His father was a coal mine foreman, and Jones showed an early determination not to follow that occupation.

Education

Through odd jobs and a $150 loan, Jones managed to enroll at Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, in 1895. He graduated in 1898 and entered Harvard College. HE completed the B. A. degree in 1902.

Career

While studying Jones supported himself as a correspondent for several newspapers. He became private secretary to Samuel L. Powers, a Republican congressman from Massachusetts.

After graduation and a brief trip abroad, he worked as a reporter for three New York papers: the Globe (1903 - 1905), the Press (1905 - 1912), and the Sun (1912 - 1917). In 1917 he left journalism and took a job with the H. K. McCann advertising agency.

World War I changed the pattern of Jones's life. He won notice early in 1917 with America Entangled, a lurid account of German spying and the sinking of the Lusitania. Far more important was his work for the Liberty Loan Committee of New York (1917 - 1919). In this work he displayed a systematic attention to detail and a flair for publicity.

Early in 1919 Thomas W. Lamont hired Jones as general manager of the Harvard Endowment Fund. At Harvard, Jones applied the lessons he had learned while selling liberty bonds, and within a year had raised the unprecedented sum of $14. 2 million. The Harvard campaign marked a new era in financing higher education, both in the dollar goal and in the tightly organized fund-raising organization.

Jones and some associates from Harvard moved to New York City, and on Nov. 23, 1919, incorporated the John Price Jones Corporation. While fund raising always predominated, Jones also sought business in public relations. The firm's purpose, he wrote in 1921, was "to originate and promote an idea. "

The John Price Jones Corporation made a profit from its first year. Jones and a staff that numbered more than 100 by the mid-1920's perfected the techniques for raising money for colleges, hospitals, and other causes. The firm's library became the nation's finest collection on philanthropy. During the early years of the Great Depression, Jones organized relief drives in Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York City that raised nearly $79 million.

When he sold control of the company in 1955 and retired, he had managed campaigns that raised a total of $836, 380, 351. In his later years he lived on a farm in Bucks County, Pennsylvania; he died in Philadelphia. A fund raiser to the last, he left his considerable estate ultimately to Phillips Exeter and Harvard.

Achievements

• John Price Jones was the famous Public Relations executive, who raised a billion dollars in philanthropy for Philips Exeter and Harvard University. During World War II he played a major part in both United Service Organizations (USO) and Red Cross campaigns. He made the American Cancer Society into a leading medical appeal. During all his career Jones viewed fund raising as a new profession and worked to establish high standards and professional ethics.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The German Secret Service in America

    (Unlike some other reproductions of classic texts (1) We h...)

Views

Jones stressed carefully written plans, explicit goals, recruitment of effective volunteer workers, and a quota system to identify potential donors and the amounts they would be asked to contribute. He insisted on large print for brochures, arguing that rich people tend to be elderly and to wear glasses.

Quotations: "Think it out first, " Jones advised, "then write. After that it probably won't need much talking over. "

Personality

Jones was an awkward public speaker, and never personally asked for a donation. He was an avid memo writer who required daily and weekly reports from his staff. He supervised employees closely and demanded facts, not guesses. Despite his newspaper experience Jones did not write easily, but he was a demanding critic.

In private Jones was quiet and gentle, but with his employees he could be gruff. They remembered modest pay and hard work, but generous help when in need. Many who moved on to high positions elsewhere regarded Jones as the great teacher of fund-raising techniques.

Quotes from others about the person

• In the words of his longtime colleague Robert F. Duncan, Jones was "the right man in the right place at the right time. "
  
  One longtime associate remembered "his livid and furious eloquence when anyone used in his presence the very word 'assume. '"

Interests

• Jones had few interests beyond his business and a love for the outdoors and regular physical exercise. His loyalties were to Phillips Exeter, Harvard, and the Republican party.

Connections

Jones married Frieda B. Suppes on December 5, 1905; they had no children.

Father:

David F. Jones Price

Mother:

Leah Price

Spouse:

Frieda B. Suppes

colleague:

Robert F. Duncan