Billy Mac Jones, Former Memphis State University President
Richard
Billy Mac Jones was 82
By Mary Powers
Sunday, October 28, 2007
As president of Memphis State University, Billy Mac Jones launched a
new era of community and alumni outreach.
Dr. Jones, a historian, author and one-time high school football
coach, was the eighth president of what would become the University of
Memphis. He held post from 1973 until 1980, when he accepted an
endowed chair at Wichita State University's Center for
Entrepreneurship in Wichita, Kansas.
He died Saturday in a Texas nursing home. He was 82.
Colleagues praised him for his scholarship, vision and discipline. "He
loved to talk education and never lost his interest in history," said
his son, Scotty Jones of Newport Beach, Calif.
In Memphis, Dr. Jones helped dismantle the ivy walls that sometimes
separated the university from the community, said Charles Holmes,
retired U of M director of community relations. Dr. Jones expanded
evening and non-credit continuing education courses. He also invited
community organizations to meet on campus and increased alumni
outreach.
"He broadened the base of our support," said R. Eugene Smith, the
retired U of M vice president of business and finance. Smith met Dr.
Jones when he was an assistant football coach at Middle Tennessee
State University and Smith was a student trainer.
Holmes said Dr. Jones created the university's first development
office, whose staff now raise millions annually to help fund operating
expenses, scholarships and research. In 1998, the U of M named the
building that housed the development offices in his honor.
Dr. Jones and his late wife later endowed a U of M scholarship in
memory of their son, Russell A. Jones, who died in a 1994 car crash.
He was a U of M graduate.
Smith said Dr. Jones was supportive of both athletics and academics.
"He worked to raise the quality of academic programs," he said.
In 1979, Jones said the university was treated fairly when the
National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) placed its athletic
program on a two-year probation. At the time, an NCAA official praised
the university's through investigation of the recruiting violations
and commitment to complying with the rules.
Dr. Jones, a Texas native, traveled to Tennessee to play football and
earn a bachelor's degree in history and business from Vanderbilt
University. He went on to earn a master's degree from Nashville's
George Peabody College and a doctorate in history and political
science from Texas Tech.
During World War II, he served in the Navy, Scotty Jones said.
His career included coaching stints at Nashville's Hillsboro High
School and Texas A&M University. He also taught history and served in
administrative position at a a junior college in San Angelo, Texas,
and later at Texas Tech and Angelo State Universities.
He was in his fourth year as president of Southwest Texas State
University in San Marcos, Texas, when he accepted an offer to succeed
Dr. Cecil C. Humphreys in Memphis.
Scotty Jones said his father retired from Wichita State after about
eight years to focus on writing books about business and the history
of the Southwest.
Dr. Jones, the widower of Doris Jane Hudson Jones, leaves his wife,
Dorothy Robinson Gaye Jones of San Angelo; two other sons, Jeffrey
Jones of Memphis and Woody Jones of Houston; and Scotty Jones of
Newport Beach, Calif., 10 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.
Funeral services are scheduled for Monday in San Angelo, Texas, with
burial Tuesday in Colleyville, Texas. Johnson Funeral Home in San
Angelo has charge.
http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2007/oct/28/former-u-m-president-passes-away/
The Memphis Commercial Appeal