Obituary: Harold Jones, Former Bridgehampton Resident, Dies at 86

Info via Sullivan Funeral Home

Harold Y. Jones, a former Bridgehampton resident, died on Tuesday, March 17. He was 86.

Jones was born in Bridgehampton on October 28, 1928 and attended Hampton Bays High School and graduated from Southampton High School.

He went on to attend the University of Tennessee, Knoxville and graduated with a degree in journalism.

He won the Inter-American Press Association Scholarship and studied for a year in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

He later obtained a master’s degree in journalism from the University of Missouri, Colombia, and a law degree from California College of Law.

From 1950 to 1952, Jones served in Company F 511th Airborne Infantry Regiment in Fort Campbell, Kentucky, and earned the Senior Parachutist Badge after making 50 jumps.

He worked for many news organizations, including the Knoxville News Sentinel, United Press International, San Francisco Daily Commercial News and Copley News Service where he served as a foreign correspondent in Buenos Aires, Argentina; Mexico City, Mexico; and Saigon, Vietnam.

He interviewed many important figures in the 1960s and 1970s in Latin America including revolutionary Che Guevara and writer Jorge Luis Borges, along with Presidents Diaz Ordaz and Lopez Mateos of Mexico; Salvador Allende of Chile; Anastasio Somoza of Nicaragua; Jose Napoleon Duarte of El Salvador; and Alfredo Stroessner of Paraguay.

He also interviewed noteworthy Americans visiting Latin America including Robert Kennedy, Presidents Nixon and Johnson, Governor Edmund Brown, and actor John Wayne, writer Benjamin Spock and astronaut Wally Schirra.

Later on, he became a university professor, teaching journalism at several campuses in the California State University system, as well as at Mary Washington University in Virginia, and Bentley University and Emerson College in Massachusetts.

Jones is survived by his wife, Mary Thompson-Jones, his children, Andrea Williams, Gareth Jones and Gwyneth Jones; son-in-law Sean Williams; grandchildren Colin and Elinor; cousins Sharon, Rachel, Jennifer, and Muriel; parents-in-law Chet and Mary Thompson; and brothers-in-law Chet and Colin.