Buck Jones(1891-1942)
- Actor
- Producer
- Director
Buck Jones was one of the greatest of the "B" western stars. Although
born in Indiana, Jones reportedly (but disputedly) grew up on a ranch near Red Rock
in Indian Territory (now Oklahoma), and there learned the riding and
shooting skills that would stand him in good stead as a hero of
Westerns. He joined the army as a teenager and served on US-Mexican
border before seeing service in the Moro uprising in the Philippines.
Though wounded, he recuperated and re-enlisted, hoping to become a
pilot. He was not accepted for pilot training and left the army in
1913. He took a menial job with the Miller Brothers 101 Ranch Wild West
Show and soon became champion bronco buster for the show. He moved on
to the Julia Allen Show, but with the beginning of the First World War,
Jones took work training horses for the Allied armies. After the war,
he and his wife, Odelle Osborne, whom he had met in the Miller Brothers
show, toured with the Ringling Brothers circus, then settled in
Hollywood, where Jones got work in a number of Westerns starring
Tom Mix and
Franklyn Farnum. Producer
William Fox put Jones under contract
and promoted him as a new Western star. He used the name Charles Jones
at first, then Charles "Buck" Jones, before settling on his permanent
stage name. He quickly climbed to the upper ranks of Western stardom,
playing a more dignified, less gaudy hero than Mix, if not as austere
as William S. Hart. With his famed horse
Silver, Jones was one of the most successful and popular actors in the
genre, and at one point he was receiving more fan mail than any actor
in the world. Months after America's entry into World War II, Jones
participated in a war-bond-selling tour. On November 28, 1942, he was a
guest of some local citizens in Boston at the famed Coconut Grove
nightclub. Fire broke out and nearly 500 people died in one of the
worst fire disasters on record. Jones was horribly burned and died two
days later before his wife Dell could arrive to comfort him. Although
legend has it that he died returning to the blaze to rescue others (a
story probably originated by producer
Trem Carr for whatever reason), the actual
evidence indicates that he was trapped with all the others and
succumbed as most did, trying to escape. He remains, however, a hero to
thousands who followed his film adventures.