HUNTSVILLE – Huntsville will say goodbye to one of its most prominent citizens this week. Raymond B. Jones, for whom Jones Valley is named, died at age 87 following an ATV crash last Friday.
“You cannot define Huntsville’s progressive history without illustrating the contributions by Ray Jones and the entire Jones family,” said Shane Davis, director of Urban and Economic Development for the city of Huntsville. “Mr. Jones led one of Alabama’s oldest engineering firms providing design for Huntsville International Airport, area roads and utilities, and numerous residential communities. Ray also ensured that any development of family land within Jones Valley would provide a positive impact to the Huntsville community.
“Ray Jones always wanted what was best for Huntsville. He truly is part of the legacy of the Huntsville we enjoy today.”
Jones’s story is a Huntsville love story.
According to his biography at the Alabama Business Hall of Fame where he was inducted in 2007, Jones was four years old when his father, Cart T. Jones moved his family back to Huntsville to start an engineering business.
The family moved onto what was said to have been a “rundown” 2,800-acre farm Carl and his brother Ed bought, as a backup plan if their engineering business failed.
Ray grew up tilling the land and herding cattle, going off to school at Auburn to study animal science, hatching pheasants to sell to restaurants to pay for school.
After completing his military obligation after college, Ray returned to Jones Valley in 1957 to manage the farming operations. Over the next decade, the farm flourished, tripling the cattle population. The business expanded when Jones bought two farms in Jackson and Marshall counties.
Ray took over as president and, later, CEO of the family’s engineering firm when his father died in 1967, putting him in charge of three farms and G. W. Jones & Sons Consulting Engineers. The company was started by Ray’s grandfather in 1886 and is still in business.
Ray Jones was president of the North Alabama Mineral Development Co.; president and CEO of R. B. Jones and Associates; president of Valley Bend at Jones Farm; and he was involved in real estate endeavors ranging from apartment complexes to subdivision developments.
The Jones family donated the land on the corner of Carl T. Jones Drive and Garth Road to build Mayfair Church of Christ where Ray served as a deacon and missionary.
Jones received was cited for his business and civic leadership He also was president of the Madison County Cattleman’s Association and the Alabama Cattleman’s Association.
In 1996, Jones became the first and only Alabamian to be awarded the “Sunbelt Farmer of the Year.”
He received the Distinguished Service Award from the Huntsville/Madison County Chamber of Commerce in 2002 and served on the board of trustees of Lipscomb University in Nashville for the last 23 years where he was pivotal in founding the Raymond B. Jones College of Engineering there.
In 1999, he was awarded an honorary doctorate’s from the University of Alabama in Huntsville and served as chairman of the UAH Foundation.
“We are, all of us, the recipients of the courage, hard work, and vision that has come down to us from our forefathers,” Jones said in a newspaper interview several years ago. “Our duty is to build on that heritage while invoking the blessings of our heavenly Father and always giving thanks to Him for the privilege of living in this great land that we call America.”
Rest in peace Raymond B. Jones.
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