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Archiver > MOSTFRAN > 2006-07 > 1152734193


From: Alanna Scanlon <>
Subject: William B Jones
Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2006 12:56:33 -0700 (PDT)


Dear List,

When I was a child, my parents took me with them to visit a relative. I did not find out who she was until long after I was an adult and she was long gone and her child did not know or care.

The wife was the first cousin of Will Jones' second wife. Her husband knew Will very well. He told me that Will was a mechanical genius. He said never let anyone tell you any differently.

I met his oldest child from his first marriage when I was even younger. He said that Will had designed a special whistle for the mines and the whistle had been moved to a factory in Farmington at that time. Where it is now, who knows?

In 1902 the World's Fair was held in St Louis. Will, as a mining supervisor analyst, etc., supervised the setting up of the mining exhibit. He was so well known in ways to remove water out of the mines. He traveled up and down the mining area to work on problems. That is why he met his second wife when his first one died. He was in here area.

A son from his second marriage told me that because there was no form of communication as phone, telegraph, a horse and rider were sent to get him from his farm to go to the mine because of trouble.

New equipment designs were sent to him.

He was the highest paid man under the mining owners and bought the first car in the area.

A woman when again I was a child said that he had a beautiful voice and had a song for any occasion. When he was older, he would no longer sing as he said his voice was no longer good.

When his health no longer allowed him to go down in the mines, again not to work, just to observe, the mine owners said Bye with no pension, etc. He had two young children to raise. He left MO, as he did not want his boys to go into mining.

I was in Montana when I was an adult and saw a flat cable hoist that had been used at the Fair. The flat cable was used in special places. The machine was rusting away at that time. It may be gone now.

I would love to have met him, but he was long long gone when I was born! Everyone was old or gone when I was born. Darn!

Alanna

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