Saturday, July 6, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.
SUN STAFF REPORTS
In 1955, SUN photographer Ken Jones was driving along Main Street, returning from an assignment at Lake Mead, when he saw two police cars parked oddly in front of a rooming house.
A woman came running out of the house, saying a policeman was down inside.
Jones had one shot left and two or three flashbulbs. He ran into the rooming house and saw the cop lying face down in the hallway.
Two other officers were walking away from him, down the hall, looking for a suspect.
"They didn't know I was behind them, and when I snapped a picture, it startled them," Jones says. "They could have easily shot me, 'cause they had their guns drawn."
He, of course, was lucky -- not only because they didn't shoot him but because he had only one shot left in his camera.
"Fortunately, I learned a lesson: Don't use up all your film, in cases something happens," Jones says.
That lesson has served him well for 42 years as a photographer for the SUN.
But the man who, in Las Vegas' early days, photographed just about every famous person to visit here is ready to take his last newspaper shot.
At age 82, Jones will retire July 15. He started working at the SUN in 1951 but left after eight months to attend to personal business in his native Ohio.
Homesick for Las Vegas, he returned to the SUN in 1954 -- this time for good.
"I was old when I got here," he says with a laugh.
For the last 25 or 30 years (he's lost count), Ken Jones has been best known as the SUN's man-on-the-street photographer.
Watching him cajole and gently coax people into having their pictures taken for the SUN's "Street Talk" feature it's easy to forget his origins as a hard-boiled news photographer.
He's captured -- on film, that is -- criminals, streakers, spectacular fires, showgirls and famous faces.
No celebrity visitor to Las Vegas could escape his lens.
During his first stay in Las Vegas he got an exclusive interview with Eleanor Roosevelt.
"The SUN got a tip that she was going to be at old McCarran Airport," he says. "I got the assignment, and the reporter was supposed to meet me, but he didn't show up and the R-J didn't get the tip."
Mrs. Roosevelt was on an airplane tour that stopped to refuel in Las Vegas.
Jones doesn't remember what they talked about, but he does recall that she was "real gracious."
While he says Eleanor Roosevelt was the most interesting person he's met in his career, Zsa Zsa Gabor made him practically salivate. (Just check out the photo he took of her that accompanies this story.)
Then there was JFK.
Jones was at a news conference during John F. Kennedy's 1960 campaign stop in Las Vegas
"I was using a Speed Graphic with flashbulbs," he recalls. "I took a couple pictures while he talked. Everything was all right, but (the pop of flashbulbs) momentarily startled him and he stopped briefly.
"He went on, and I took pictures when he started to pick his nose, or it looked like he picked his nose. He stopped talking and he said, 'Don't publish it.'"
No such luck. Jones said it was published on the front page of the SUN the next day.
Jones often combined his love of scenic beauty and his eye for "good-looking gals" to produce expansive photo pages for the SUN's former Sunday magazine.
Between the natural female wonders of the Strip and the scenic wonders of Mount Charleston, Lee Canyon and Lake Mead, Jones had a veritable gold mine.
"In between marriages I'd run around with a lot of showgirls," he says. "I got a lot of hell (from his wife, LaVerne) over that."
Jones says it was a mutually beneficial proposition for the girls, who received free publicity through the photos, and for the SUN, which had something to put in the paper.
"That was a lot of fun. I met a lot of beautiful women," he says, crediting his close friend Forrest Duke, the late entertainment writer, who was in good with the local talent.
"We had no trouble getting the girls."
Jones often went to great lengths -- or should we say heights -- to get a good photo.
In conjunction with the World Congress of Flight convention, one of the city's first conventions, Jones and former SUN reporter Ed Reid, who co-authored "The Green Felt Jungle," decided to take a helicopter to the top of Mount Potosi for a story and pictures on the Carole Lombard airplane crash there years earlier.
At the time of the crash, Jones says, "the only way they could bring the bodies down was to hire Indians, who could climb. Years later you still couldn't get to the top unless you were a climber. So, we hired a helicopter."
Unfortunately, it was built only for two people and the weight of three people -- Jones, Reid and the pilot -- made it impossible to elevate. Reid stayed behind. Says Jones: "We landed right on top of the mountain; the rotor blades were touching the trees. I got out and took pictures. There were still pieces of the plane on the ground, and we brought back an elbow bone of someone who had been killed. I don't know what ever happened to it."
The famous photo of the fire that consumed the El Rancho Vegas in 1960 is sometimes credited to Jones but it was his son, Ken Jones Jr., who snapped the historic frame.
"He was working part time for the SUN," Jones explains. "He was at the front (of the building), I was at the back and he got the picture. I didn't get anything."
Ken Jones will be most remembered for "Street Talk" -- an "inquiring photographer" idea inspired by the late SUN Publisher Hank Greenspun.
"Hank always liked it," Jones says.
An editor discontinued it once while Greenspun was on vacation, but when the boss returned, it was revived.
Jones' work is a tribute to the willingness of people to get their picture in the paper and the tenacity of the photographer to make it happen.
Although he tries to make the questions topical, they can get, uh, well downright corny. Like the time he asked, "What is your favorite topping on a hot dog?" Or, "Should bow-legged women wear shorts?"
And every so often a Hooters waitress or two found their way into "Street Talk." Coincidence or design? Jones just blushes.
Sometimes Jones' "Street Talk" questions became fodder for KKLZ 96.3-FM's wise-guy disc jockeys.
To which Jones replies, "Johnson and who? No, I don't think I've heard of 'em."
"You gotta push yourself, make an ass of yourself," says Jones, citing the necessary aptitudes for a career in shooting people.
He's sitting on a stool in a favorite eatery, imparting wisdom to a pair of eager understudies and pestering a Hooters waitress with each trip to the table.
"Did you say you wanted to comment on a question for 'Street Talk'?"
"Hey, we gonna take a picture of you or not?"
"Hey, don't forget my picture."
"Hey, got a minute now?"
Jones is relentless. The waitress is skittish. Jones turns to the dog-eared "Street Talk" survival manual in his head and opens to "apprehensive subject."
"Try flattery," it suggests.
He tries some.
"You got a nice smile. Pretty eyes."
She smiles. The ol' charmer's got her.
"What's the question?" Julie asks.
"Do you think Americans are losing their sense of humor?"
He asks, she answers. She smiles, he shoots. He's out of her hair, he's got what he wants. Everyone's happy.
"I've been very fortunate," Jones says. "Very few people have refused comment. Most people have been gracious. I like the good-looking gals; they kinda brighten it up a little."
For nearly 30 years, Jones has shot 30 people a week (six a day) for "Street Talk."
The fate of the column after Jones' retirement is up in the air.
His understudies are reluctant. After all, photojournalists today enjoy the relative autonomy of their position. Having to ask a question and pose a subject for the same head-and-shoulders shot day after day -- with a happy face (ugh!) -- just can't compete with a good corpse-in-a-blanket photo.
Jones himself made the transition to full-time "Street Talk" photographer about 10 years ago. He found that he couldn't compete with the younger photographers, nor his camera with the modern equipment.
"Actually, I'm not physically able to get around like the guys today. You have to do a lot of running." He recalls an assignment at Nellis Air Force Base that convinced him to resign from daily hard-news photography.
"I had to run to keep up in time with the TV guy," he says. "It took a little bit out of me."
Also, Jones' equipment began to preclude him from participation. He was a twin-reflex man in a 35mm world, and still is. His camera, a 120mm Rolleiflex, replaced his trusty Speed Graphic about 25 years ago.
"I like the larger film," he says of his 120, which produces a negative four times the size of a 35mm.
The appeal of the job, he says, is "meeting people and finding out what people think and feel. I'd hate to sit inside all the time, watching one of those computers. That would kill me. I was wondering how those reporters can do it all day long. Going in and out (of the office) breaks the monotony and keeps things interesting."
Ken Jones was born Dec. 9, 1913, in Akron, Ohio. He attended Kent State University and worked for the Courier Tribune-Evening Record, a daily that served Kent and Ravenna.
He came to Las Vegas in 1951, but returned to Ohio eight months later to attend to some personal business -- namely, divorcing his first wife.
But he was homesick for Las Vegas. He called the SUN and was told to "c'mon back."
Ruthe Deskin, assistant to the SUN publisher, was hired the year Jones returned.
"A part of me will go when he retires," she says. "Ken has been the SUN's goodwill ambassador for many years. His gentlemanly manner and friendly attitude have endeared him to his co-workers as well as the general public. Ken deserves all the best in his retirement years. We love him."
Bryn Armstrong, the SUN's executive editor from 1962-76, says the profession is losing a fine representative.
"He was great," says Armstrong, now executive director of the state Dairy Commission in Carson City. "He was cooperative and helpful and always ready and willing. He was a real workhorse. He was ready for anything: fires, airplane crashes, whatever. There's not an awful lot left like him. I sure hope he has a nice retirement."
Endless friends and associates ruminate ad infinitum on the overall quality of Ken Jones. Throughout the years clubs and organizations would specifically ask for Jones to take photos of their events.
He's kind and gracious -- and loves to pour on the charm.
Just like he did when he met LaVerne.
She was a cocktail waitress at the old Nevada Club. He was on a photo assignment for the SUN.
"I took a picture I think of one of the owners. I asked her where the office was," Jones says. "I guess I went back a few days later to look her up. She was a pretty good-looking gal. She resisted me for a while, but I finally got her to go out with me."
LaVerne and Jones have been married for "about 39 years" now and have five children. He has two other children from a previous marriage.
Stability, loyalty, gentleness, humor -- and, yes, an eye for beauty whether it's in the form of a shapely figure or a majestic landscape -- are Ken Jones' strongest traits.
"I haven't made any money, but I've had a lot of fun," he says of his 42 years at the SUN.
"I met a lot of nice friends and raised a nice family. The Greenspuns (owners of the SUN) have been good to me. Hank was a good friend; he's always been tops in my book."
In years past, Greenspun urged Jones to take more lucrative positions in hotel publicity departments.
"I've always been thankful I stayed. It just seemed the natural place to be."
SUN REPORTER David Renzi contributed to this report.
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