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He was a character..
Wilford "Crazy Ray" Jones dies
10:23 PM CDT on Saturday, March 17, 2007
BY JENNIFER EMILY and JOE SIMNACHER / The Dallas Morning News
[email protected], [email protected]
Wilford "Crazy Ray" Jones, who turned a stint selling seat cushions at the Cotton Bowl into a nationally recognizable role as an unofficial Dallas Cowboys mascot, has died.
Mr. Jones, 76, died Saturday at an Irving ho e. Friends said he suffered from congestive heart failure and had recently had a heart attack.
"Crazy Ray" entertained decades of Cowboys fans and became a Dallas ins ution in chaps and white boots.
"This whole thing has turned out so much bigger than I ever expected," he told The Dallas Morning News in 1981. "I never want to do anything else."
Neighbors said that although Mr. Jones' recent bad health kept him away from Cowboys games, he remained an avid fan. He'll be buried in one of his costumes.
Although his funeral will be private, the family is planning a public memorial this week. No time or date had been set Saturday.
The Nacogdoches native came to Dallas in 1953 at age 22 to make a living shining shoes. His natural talents soon had him clowning toward his playful calling.
"When I first got here, I was riding a city bus and talking to a lady," Mr. Jones said in 1974. "I had a paper bag and made some sounds. She said, ‘Do you have a dog in there?' I said yes.
"So the driver said, ‘You can't have a dog on the bus.' So I threw the bag out the window.
"They all looked for the dog."
That was one of many stories Mr. Jones had told for decades that his wife, Mattie, retold Saturday when friends and family gathered around him at the ho e, friends said. He died around 11:30 a.m. with loved ones surrounding him.
The Joneses were married for 53 years. Mrs. Jones did not want to speak Saturday about her husband's death.
Although his role with the team was unofficial, he was no less important to fans and the Cowboys themselves.
"Ray was the most dedicated, entertaining and passionate of Cowboys fans," Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said Saturday. "He touched thousands of lives and generations of football fans. He will remain an important part of this team's heritage and family for as long as fans go to Cowboys games and feel his spirit."
Twenty years after he spoofed the woman on the city bus, Mr. Jones was known as the Pied Piper of Elm Street. Still holding a day job shining shoes at barber shops along Elm Street, he spent his lunch hours entertaining children with his signature antics: whistling and making balloon animals.
"I'd just whistle, act crazy and sell more than anybody," Mr. Jones once recalled. He also hung out at a magic shop downtown, learning sleight of hand from magicians.
No matter how full Mr. Jones' bag of tricks got over the years, his shrill whistle was his trademark. Its force and volume made many wonder what kind of whistle he was using and how he kept from swallowing it.
"No, it's no whistle. I just tell 'em it's a secret," Mr. Jones said of his technique.
Mr. Jones' secret was a missing front tooth and incredible lip dexterity.
Although Mr. Jones originally sold trinkets at college football and minor-league hockey games, his success skyrocketed with Dallas' professional football franchises. In the early 1960s, he began selling seat cushions at Dallas Texans games at the Cotton Bowl and went on to become the unofficial icon of America's Team, the Dallas Cowboys.
At Cowboys games, Mr. Jones would dance and clown around, sometimes riding a stick horse or scuffling with the opposing team's mascot. As his popularity eclipsed his need to sell souvenirs, the Cowboys asked him not to sell and focus on entertaining the crowd.
At the peak of his fame, Mr. Jones made frequent personal appearances, from routine showings at auto dealerships and shopping centers in Dallas to more exotic performances in Hawaii and Mexico. He even won bit parts in movies and commercials.
But in the late 1980s, Mr. Jones' health began to fail. He was sidelined by a hiatal hernia in September 1989.
In the years that followed, Mr. Jones found himself broke and in increasingly bad health. He had five heart bypass surgeries and a leg amputation. By last August, he was recovering from his fourth stroke. The strokes impaired his speed and the use of his right arm. Glaucoma blinded him.
Cowboy fans began to ask Mr. Jones if he'd retired.
"I tell them, ‘No, I just have some heart problems,'." he said.
A lack of money meant his utilities were turned off, and the Joneses had trouble paying for prescriptions.
Wayne Walker, a neighbor, coordinated efforts to help the Joneses pay bills and renovate their house. Fans donated money and Bedford-based Operation Forever Free - an organization dedicated to helping military members and their families - renovated the Korean War veteran's home with donated time and materials.
Mr. Walker didn't help the Joneses because Crazy Ray was a Dallas icon, he said Saturday.
"It's not because he's Crazy Ray," Mr. Walker said. "It's because he was a neighbor in need."
Off the field, Mr. Jones' personality was just as loving and big-hearted, recalled Richard Davis, who lived across the street from the Joneses. The two met in the mid-1960s while fishing at White Rock Lake. They became instant friends and fishing buddies - more like brothers than friends.
Mr. Jones was always looking to make people smile or better yet get a big belly laugh out of them, Mr. Davis said.
"Sometimes, he might put on ladies' clothes just to get a laugh," said Mr. Davis, grinning at the memory. "That was Crazy Ray."
In addition to his wife, Mr. Jones is survived by two brothers, Paul Jones, 62, and Jerry Jones, 64, both from the Dallas area; a sister, Eugenia Gibson, 78, of Atlanta; and two grandsons, Derrick Jackson, 38, and Darryl Jackson, 35. His daughter, Glenda, preceded him in death in 2000 at age 53.
Staff writer Todd Archer contributed to this report.
RIP, Ray
He was a character..
This was a couple days ago....
Cowboys Icon Passes
Crazy Ray Entertained Millions Over The Years
Mickey Spagnola - Email
DallasCowboys.com Columnist
March 17, 2007 6:05 PM Change Font Size A A A A
Crazy Ray roamed the Cowboys sidelines for more than 40 years, dating back to the Cotton Bowl days.
IRVING, Texas - A Dallas Cowboys sideline icon for nearly 44 years, Crazy Ray, the team's unofficial mascot since the third season back at the Cotton Bowl who endeared himself to millions of fans with his support of the Cowboys, died in his sleep at a Ho e care facility Saturday morning.
Born Wilford Jones, Crazy Ray, 76, has been beset by various illnesses over the past years, diabetes a huge toll, causing a leg to be amputated below the knee in 1997, a loss of eyesight, five heart bypass surgeries and the suffering of several strokes, the most recent this past August that left his right side paralyzed. Ray suffered another heart attack as recent as two weeks ago, and had been living under Ho e care at home since suffering his latest bout of congestive heart failure. He was moved into the Ho e care facility two days before his death.
Over the years, Crazy Ray entertained Cowboys fans at Texas Stadium in his western-style get-up, complete with six-shooters in his holster, a cowboy hat and at times, galloping along with one of those stick ponies. He became as recognizable as the blue star on the Cowboys helmet, the hole in the roof and the Hail Mary.
"Our thoughts and prayers are with Mattie and the Jones family," said Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, making reference to Crazy Ray's wife Mattie of 53 years. "This is a sad day for anyone who is a follower of the Dallas Cowboys. Ray was the most dedicated, entertaining and passionate of Cowboys fans.
"He touched thousands of lives and generations of football fans. He will remain an important part of this team's heritage and family for as long as fans go to Cowboys games and feel his spirit."
Jerry Jones is not given to hyperbole when talking of Crazy Ray's national fame. He has a spot in the fans' wing of the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio, and in the hearts of Cowboys fans world wide, all recognizing his patented whistle and the magic tricks he would perform while interacting with fans on the sideline of games. It was nothing to see Crazy Ray sparring with the Redskins' mascot in the end zone when those two NFC East rivals would play, no matter if the game was played at Texas Stadium or RFK Stadium in the nation's capital.
Ray, known to some as "Whistling Ray" for the high-pitched shrill his whistle produced, also delighted fans with the quick balloon figurines he twisted together while prowling the Texas Stadium sidelines.
The family will hold a private funeral ceremony on Thursday, and plans are under way for a public memorial to be held for fans to pay their final respects. Details still are pending.
But in recent months, fans showed how much they appreciated Crazy Ray over the years, helping the Joneses in various forms and fashions with charitable gestures. When the family car was stolen and found trashed, a local dealership anonymously donated the couple a car.
Then there was the house they had lived in for nearly 30 years. It was in need of total renovation. But Ray and Mattie had little money, Ray having spent a spell of time in a nursing home after his last stroke. They could not pay their bills. Utilities had been turned off.
But thanks to friend and neighbor Wayne Walker, director of video productions at Dallas Theological Seminary, who set up a charitable website to help the Joneses, along with a disabled veterans association program (Ray served in the Korean War) which aided with the renovation of the home, Crazy Ray and Mattie were able to move back into their home on Nov. 14 of this past year.
Many of the appliances were donated by local businesses.
Walker was quoted in a recent Dallas Observer story written by Richie Whitt, "He's such a kind, wonderful man. How can you not want to help him. I think we'd all agree he's earned it."
Donations still can be made to help the family offset funeral costs by going to www.SaveCrazyRay.com, where 100 percent of the donations are transferred directly into an account set up for the Joneses.
Along with wife Mattie, Ray is survived by two brothers, Paul Jones, 62, and Jerry Jones, 64, of the Dallas area; a sister, Eugenia Gibson, 78, of Atlanta; and two grandsons, Derrick Jackson, 38, and Darryl Jackson, 35. The daughter of Ray and Mattie Jones, Glenda, preceded him in death seven years ago.
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