Lives in Cricket No 4 - Ernie Jones

As has been stated, Jones experienced terrible personal tragedies with the deaths of two of his five children in infancy, one in early childhood and another in early adulthood. Only his oldest daughter, Mary, survived to marry and have four children. If Jones was a bluff and hearty man, the heartiness may sometimes have been disguising acute pain. More important than the legend is the reality. As Franks again noted, ‘Jones is an important reminder of a time when Australian cricket was beginning to make itself more accessible to more people. As unions campaigned for shorter and better-regulated work hours, thus giving working-class men more time for organised sport, it was Jones who led the way as Australia’s first genuinely proletarian cricketer.’ 86 The Legend