Bobby Jones

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Bobby Jones (credit: UPI)

(born March 17, 1902, Atlanta, Ga., U.S. — died Dec. 18, 1971, Atlanta) U.S. golfer. Jones won 13 major championships between 1923 and 1930, a feat unequaled until 1973. In 1930 he became the first golfer to achieve the grand-slam of his time — the British and U.S. Open and Amateur championships — after which he retired from competitive golf at the age of 28, having never become a professional. Jones helped establish the Masters Tournament, one of the four major tournaments that make up the modern grand-slam of golf (the other three being the British Open, the U.S. Open, and the PGA Championship).

For more information on Bobby Jones, visit Britannica.com.

television show host; gospel singer

Personal Information

Born c. 1939, in Paris, TN.
Education: Received master's degree from Tennessee State University; earned Ph.D. from Vanderbilt University.

Career

Taught in Nashville, TN; textbook consultant for an educational publishing house; Tennessee State University, Nashville, instructor in reading and study skills, from 1972 until mid-1980s; launched second career as a gospel singer, c. 1972; formed gospel group, New Life, in Nashville, TN, c. 1975; has recorded over ten albums; host and producer, The Bobby Jones Gospel Hour, 1980--.

Life's Work

"What Dick Clark is to rock 'n' roll and Don Cornelius is to soul, Bobby Jones is to gospel music," declared Washington Post writer Mike Joyce in 1995. Since 1980, Jones has hosted the Bobby Jones Gospel Hour, which airs weekly on the Black Entertainment Television (BET) cable network. Like its counterparts in pop and soul, the Hour offers gospel fans live performances by well-known names in the industry along with interview clips and album reviews. Though little-known outside of gospel music circles, Jones remains a powerful force in the industry.

Jones, born in Paris, Tennessee, was a schoolteacher in Nashville for a time after earning his master's degree from Tennessee State University. He left his teaching job to become a textbook consultant specializing in elementary education, then began teaching reading skills at Tennessee State University in the early 1970s. Around this same time, he also began a second career as a singer on the gospel circuit, and continued his activism in the local civil-rights movement and his church. Seeing an opportunity to merge the drive for African American economic independence with an already-established sense of community among Nashville's black churches, in 1976 he helped create the city's first Black Expo. Inspired in part by Jesse Jackson's Operation PUSH in Chicago, Black Expo featured numerous serious workshops, but had also attracted some of its 50,000 attendees with a host of concerts. A young Natalie Cole was one of Jones's hired performers in Black Expo's early years.

Black Expo also attracted the attention of local media executives, and as Jones explained in the interview with Joyce for the Washington Post, "at that time affirmative action was in place and Channel 4 in Nashville didn't have its complete number of black programmers in place," he recalled. "So we asked if we could do a pilot for a gospel show--and it's been running ever since." The Nashville Gospel Show was a hit in the area, but Jones jumped ship in 1980 when he was invited by Robert Johnson, founder of the fledgling Black Entertainment Television (BET) network, to bring an hour of gospel television to the new cable network. The Bobby Jones Gospel Hour was one of the first shows on BET, which during its first few lean years on the air could only afford to offer a few hours of programming a week.

The Hour came to be known as a showcase for gospel-music giants who enjoyed little national exposure otherwise. Since the BET studios were in Washington, for several years Jones flew back and forth from Nashville to tape the show. He also continued his career as a recording artist, cutting gospel records with the New Life Choir such as I'll Never Forget. In 1984, he won his first Grammy Award for a duet with country music singer Barbara Mandrell, "I'm So Glad I'm Standing Here Today." The two had met when both were cutting tracks at the same Nashville recording studio, and became friends. Mandrell appeared on Jones' show, and the unlikely duo even toured together until her 1985 automobile accident. Since then, other country music stars have also appeared on the Gospel Hour, such as Marty Robbins and Ricky Skaggs; even pop artists such as Marilyn McCoo and Billy Davis Jr. have been guests, but everybody sings gospel. "We're trying to bridge ideologies to the focal point--the works of Jesus," Jones told Joe Edwards for the Chicago Tribune. "... [O]ur goal is to bring one's attention to the wonderful design of the Bible."

Jones later expanded his presence on BET with the half-hour show, Video Gospel, which he also hosts. The Bobby Jones Gospel Hour is broadcast on the American Christian Network and the Armed Forces radio and television stations, giving Jones an audience of gospel fans around the world in countries that include Nigeria and Holland. Jones himself has also performed internationally, including stops in Israel and Africa, and sang at the White House for President Jimmy Carter; he was also invited to appear before Ronald Reagan in a performance at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

Jones kept his teaching job at Tennessee State as late as the mid-1980s, and by then had also earned a doctorate in curriculum leadership from Vanderbilt University. He has a record label, GospoCentric, and in addition to his television responsibilities has brought an increased awareness for the music form since 1989 with his live tours known as the "Bobby Jones Gospel Explosions." His three-day event in 1998 at Walt Disney World's Epcot Center-- part of its Black History month celebrations--featured such gospel all-stars as CeCe Winans, John P. Kee, and Albertina Walker. His "Mini-Explosions" bring gospel music to audiences in smaller cities across the United States as well as in Europe and the Caribbean.

When asked by James D. Davis of the Sun-Sentinel, "How did gospel music become more popular?," Jones replied, "My show. It's catapulted gospel into a whole new era. Before, you had only radio and concerts. TV has opened gospel up to a lot of people." Based on his fan club roster, Jones once estimated that a good portion of his viewing audience was white, proving a wider audience for the music existed far beyond most preconceptions. "I want to be one of the people to bring gospel music to the real marketplace by educating people about its marvelous and unique features," he told Edwards in the Chicago Tribune. "It should be placed where any good music is," he added. Jones is also committed to holding the door open for a new generation of singers, and his Explosions tours often feature well-known local acts, such as Washington, D.C.'s William Becton and Friends. Record-industry personnel attend the shows, but Jones is also careful to mix the vintage and the up-and- coming. "It is important for young people to know who paved the way for us," he told Hamil R. Harris in the Washington Post. "You can't go into the future without knowing the past," he continued.

For the Doubleday publishing house, Jones is working on a book that compiles testimonials from well-known gospel personalities. In his off-hours, he likes Las Vegas, though he does not gamble, but instead loves its musical offerings. In the Sun-Sentinel interview, Davis also asked him what he hoped his ultimate legacy would be. "I would like to be known for completing what the Lord gave me to do, bringing people together, spreading love, like serving water," Jones replied. "Without that, I am nothing," he concluded.

Awards

Grammy Award, National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, 1984, for "I'm So Glad I'm Standing Here Today"; also the recipient of Dove Awards.

Further Reading

Periodicals

• Billboard, March 29, 1997, p. 17.
• Chicago Tribune, November 7, 1985, p. 13D.
• Nation's Business, February 1995, p. 13.
• Washington Post, July 7, 1995, p. N13; July 17, 1995, p. D1.

• Sun-Sentinel interview at http://southflorida.digitalcity.com/DCComunity/c0fvp113.htm

— Carol Brennan

Bobby Jones may refer to:

• Dr Bobby Jones (academic), American academic
• Bobby Jones (footballer), former Bristol Rovers, Northampton Town & Swindon Town player
• Bobby Jones (goalkeeper), former footballer with Southport, Chester and Blackburn
• Bobby Jones (golfer) (1902–1971)
• Bobby Jones (right-handed pitcher) (born 1970), right-handed baseball pitcher
• Bobby Jones (left-handed pitcher) (born 1972), left-handed baseball pitcher
• Bobby Jones (basketball, born 1951), former professional basketball player
• Bobby Jones (basketball, born 1984), American professional basketball player
• Bobby Jones (basketball coach), head men's basketball coach at Saint Francis University
• Bobby Jones (singer) (born 1939), gospel singer
• Bobby Jones (saxophonist) (1928–1980), American jazz saxophonist
• Robert Jones (jockey), aka Bobby Jones, (1913–1938), American Champion jockey

See also:

• Bob Jones (disambiguation)
• Robert Jones (disambiguation)
• Jones (surname)

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