Jesse Jones: The Man Behind the Houston Skyline

According to author Steven Fenberg, “Three momentous events occurred around the start of the twentieth century that changed Houston forever: the 1900 Galveston hurricane, the discovery of oil at Spindletop, and Jesse Jones’s move from Dallas to Houston.”

Jones is the man probably most responsible for the city and skyline of the Houston we recognize today. Mr. Houston, as some called him, built 35 downtown skyscrapers, including the Rice and Lamar hotels. He was instrumental in the construction of the Houston Ship Channel and the San Jacinto Monument. Jones lobbied to have the 1928 Democratic National Convention in Houston. He bought and was responsible for making the Houston Chronicle a major newspaper. Along with Ross Sterling, who later became governor, Jones cofounded the Humble Oil Company, which later became ExxonMobil. All of these accomplishments came through a man who had only an eighth-grade education.

Jesse Holman Jones was born in Robertson County, Tennessee in 1874. He was the son of William Hasque Jones and Laura Anna Holman Jones. Jesse and his five siblings lived on the family’s 100-acre tobacco farm. His mother died of tuberculosis just 17 days after his sixth birthday. His father’s widowed sister, Nancy Jones Hunt, assumed the role of Jesse’s mother. Nancy’s husband died fighting for the Confederacy during the Civil War.

William Jones moved his family to Texas because he thought the children could get a better education in Dallas. Jesse’s uncle and aunt, Martin Tilford (known in the family as “M.T.”) and Louisa also played an important role in his life. They were founding members of St. Paul’s Methodist Church, the DePelchin Faith Home for orphans and the Young Women’s Cooperative Home for indigent pregnant women. M.T. was founding president of the South Texas Commercial National Bank. After his uncle’s death, Jones managed the entire M.T. Jones estate and looked after his Aunt Louisa until her death.

Jesse Jones had a long and prosperous career in the business world. After working for his uncle M.T.’s lumber yard in Terrell, Texas, Jesse established his own lumber business, South Texas Lumber. Owning his own lumberyard ushered Jones into a career as a developer and builder. Construction was Jones’s passion. He actively participated in all aspects of construction, including negotiating prices of equipment, furnishings, and materials. At the time of his death in 1956, he owned 100 buildings in Houston. Jones also built skyscrapers in Dallas, Fort Worth, Nashville, and New York City. In 1913, after acquiring a 99-year lease from Rice University, Jones built the 18-story luxury Rice Hotel on the site of Texas’s first capitol building. The hotel was located at the corner of Texas and Main streets. Jones believed in the concept of reciprocity: he would prosper if Houston prospered.

In 1908, Jones became a partner with Houston Chronicle founder Marcellus E. Foster. He built a 10-story office building for the newspaper downtown at the corner of Travis Street and Texas Avenue in exchange for half ownership of the newspaper. In 1926, he bought the other half from Foster because of disagreements about Foster’s endorsement of Miriam A. “Ma” Ferguson’s campaign for Texas governor.

Jones wanted to transform Houston into a port city. He was a major proponent of the construction of the ship channel. The U.S. government said that if Houston would pay half of the costs, it would pay the rest. Jones called on his banking colleagues to buy bonds with their capital surpluses. In 24 hours he secured Houston’s half of the funds needed to begin construction of the ship channel. The Houston mayor, Ben Campbell, appointed Jones as the harbor board chairman.

The opening of the ship channel in 1914 came with much fanfare. President Woodrow Wilson pressed a button at the White House, which with the aid of the MacKay Telegraph-Cable Company and the Southern Pacific Railroad, fired a cannon on the bank of Buffalo Bayou. The Houston Ship Channel officially opened for business. The mayor’s daughter then dropped a floral wreath into the water to christen the channel. The people attending the ceremony fired cannon and gun salutes, rang bells, whistled and shouted, and bands played patriotic songs. That evening, 20 floats representing five different nations and cultures proceeded down Main Street. Some were illuminated by torches and others with electric lights. Various dignitaries, bands, soldiers and politicians marched in the parade. The week ended with exciting airplane maneuvers, a parade with automobiles decorated with flowers, and elaborate parties and balls.

Jesse Jones drew the plans for the San Jacinto Monument in Pasadena and was involved in planning the 1936 Texas Centennial. The monument was dedicated to the valiant soldiers who died fighting for Texas’s independence from Mexico. At the ceremony attendees sang “Will You Come to the Bower?” which was the San Jacinto soldiers’ battle song.

President Wilson in 1917 appointed Jones to be in charge of fundraising for the American Red Cross in Houston. Jones wrote a personal check for $5,000 and challenged his friends and colleagues to match it. The fundraising campaign was so successful that Wilson appointed him to head the Department of Military Relief, a branch of the American Red Cross. The department provided medical aid to soldiers going to Europe which was suffering the ravages of war. It also kept soldiers in contact with their families and provided financial assistance to families whose primary wage earners went to war.

Jones secured the 1928 Democratic National Convention for Houston with a bid of $200,000. This was the first national convention since the Civil War to be held in the South. Jones was the financial director of the Democratic National Committee. To house the convention’s 25,000 to 30,000 attendees, a temporary hall was built on the western edge of downtown near Buffalo Bayou. Kenneth Franzheim and Albert C. Finn designed the building, which was called the Sam Houston Hall. It was longer than three football fields and used more than one million feet of East Texas pine. The hall was a third larger than Madison Square Garden in New York City. It covered six acres. The Hobby Center for Performing Arts presently stands on the site of Sam Houston Hall.

Jones accomplished three things: bringing the convention to Houston, retiring the Democratic Party’s debt, and ending with a surplus. The Texas delegation wanted to nominate Jones for president, but he declined, saying that he had no political aspirations. The convention nominated New York Governor Al Smith, who went on to lose the 1928 presidential election to Republican Herbert Hoover.

During the nation’s financial collapse in the early 1930s, Jesse Jones was a key player in saving Houston banks. Several major banks were on the verge of collapse. This would not only impact Houston but also much of the south and southwest. If one of the banks failed, others would probably follow and many other small banks would be affected. Jones met with Houston bankers to gather $1.25 million to rescue the ailing institutions. This action was successful and ensured that no Houston banks would fail.

President Herbert Hoover noticed this accomplishment and in 1932, named Jones to the board of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation. The corporation, better known as the RFC, provided emergency loans to failing banks and businesses to help put America back on its feet economically. Jones was named RFC director when Franklin Roosevelt was elected president in 1933. As a result of Jones’s leadership, the U.S. Treasury accrued $500 million in profit on the more than $10 million in loans made by the RFC.

Under the umbrella of the RFC, Jones established the Federal National Mortgage Association (FNMA), which became known as Fannie Mae. Fannie Mae bought government-insured mortgages from lenders, who then used the proceeds from the sales to make new loans.

During World War II, Jones used the RFC to speed up national defense production of high-test aviation gasoline, metal, and rubber. He had a powerful position in the RFC, second only to the president. In 1939, President Roosevelt appointed him federal loan officer. President Roosevelt appointed Jones Secretary of Commerce in 1940. Jones held this position for five years.

During the devastation of the Great Depression, Jones helped save thousands of banks, business, farms, homes, and railroads, as well as the country’s financial structure. He demonstrated how government could make money and help people at the same time. He showed how business and government can join together to build industries to protect people, aid the common good while nurturing free enterprise, and overcome dependence on foreign countries for necessary resources.

Jones and his wife, Mary Gibbs Jones, established the Houston Endowment Inc. in 1937, which has grown into one of the largest private philanthropic foundations in the country. Houston Endowment funds the arts, health care, human services, medical research, and student scholarships.

Jones valued education and felt disadvantaged because of his lack of it. During his lifetime he received several honorary degrees and believed that one of the advantages of going to college was that students learn how to learn. By the time of his death on June 1, 1956, Jones had helped more than 4,000 students through scholarship programs in 57 colleges and universities. He established the Commercial and Industrial Life Insurance Company for the employees of his businesses and gave the company to the Houston Endowment. He also gave Houston Endowment controlling interest in the Houston Chronicle Publishing Company, KTRH radio, and the Rice Hotel. Among those that benefited from the Houston Endowment were the University of Houston, Rice University, scholarships to honor World War II military heroes, and the American Red Cross. Another recipient was the library at the Texas Medical Center, which was the only building that Jones allowed to be named after him while he was alive.

Along with Edward Angly, Jones wrote Fifty Billion Dollars: My Thirteen Years with the RFC, which was published in 1951.

Jesse Jones was loyal to Houston, his adopted hometown. International News Service reporter Inez Robb interviewed Jones shortly before his death. She said, “You talk of Houston the way a person usually speaks of heaven.”

Jones responded, “Do you think heaven is anything like Houston? Eventually, I suppose I will be lucky enough to be inside the pearly gates. But I will be happier if it is just a mite like Houston.”

Sources Consulted

R. Jack Cagle, “Jesse H. Jones,” accessed at https://www.hcp4.net/Community/Parks/Jones/About/WhoIs.

Steven Fenberg, Unprecedented Power: Jesse Jones, Capitalism, and the Common Good. College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2011.

Maggie Galehouse, “Jesse Jones is the subject of a new biography from Houston author,” Houston Chronicle, October 22, 2011, accessed at https://www.chron.com/life/article/Jesse-Jones-is-the-subject-of-a-new-biography-2228837.php.

Houston Endowment, Brother, Can You Spare a Billion? The Story of Jesse H. Jones (Video). Houston Public Television, 2000.

“Mr. Houston: Jesse Jones helped shape the Chronicle as well as the 20th century” (unsigned article), Houston Chronicle, October 14, 2001, accessed at https://www.chron.com/about/first-100/article/Mr-Houston-Jesse-Jones-helped-shape-the-2076119.php.

“Jesse Jones: Behind the Houston skyline” (unsigned article), accessed at https://www.uth.edu/blog/bout-time/post.htm?id=c9b3a00b-fc90-4783-b633-b0d9b219068f.

Kyrie O’Connor, “Jesse H Jones: A civic-minded powerhouse,” Houston Chronicle, May 19, 2016, accessed at https://www.houstonchronicle.com/local/history/article/Jesse-H-Jones-A-civic-minded-powerhouse-7731106.php.

Lionel V. Patenaude, “Jones, Jesse Holman.” Handbook of Texas Online, accessed at https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fjo53.