Stanley Joseph Jones (1923 - 1973)

Born 16 Mar 1923 in Victoria, Australia

Husband of Alma Veronica (O'Brien) Jones — married 1942 in Victoria, Australia

Died 3 Mar 1973 at age 49 in Hounslow, London, England, United Kingdom

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Biography

Stanley Jones is Notable.

Stanley Jones was born in Victoria, Australia

Stanley Joseph 'Stan' Jones was born on 16th March 1923 in Victoria, Australia. He was raised in Warrandyte, in Melbourne's north, by his grandfather. ^[1]

Aged nineteen years, Stan married Alma O'Brien in 1942 in Victoria. ^[2]

He became a Holden car dealer, Stan Jones Motors Pty Ltd, at 211 Keilor Road, North Essendon. The business ended up in bankruptcy, as a result of 'bad management', due to being unable to fully support the costs of Stan's racing career.

Stan raced the Maybach Specials, the last of the great Australian-built racing cars to remain competitive against the imported European Formula 1 cars, before racing a Maserati 250F. He finished first in the 1956 New South Wales Road Racing Championship for Racing Cars in his Maserati. He won the 1958 Australian Drivers' Championship, having finished third in the inaugural championship the year before. Over the next two years, he finished third (in the Maserati 250F, and a Maybach III-Chevrolet, Sabakat-Porsche and Cooper T51-Climax) and fourth (Cooper T51-Climax) respectively, auguably the greatest of Australia's early open-wheeler drivers. Stan is one of eleven drivers to have won the Australian (1959) and New Zealand Grands Prix (1954).

After two strokes, Stan moved to London, England to be with his son, Formula Three front-runner Alan. As, apparently, Stan and Alan were not particularly close, some say the move was to 'escape creditors'. He passed away aged almost fifty years, on 3rd March 1973 in Hounslow, in western London. ^[3]

Alan went on win the 1978 Can-Am Championship in a Lola and the 1980 World Driver's Championship; the first to do so in a Williams Formula One car. He came ever-so-close to also winning the 1979 world championship and finished third in 1981. He is the last Aussie to win the Australian Grand Prix, a feat he achieved in 1980 in his world championship-winning Williams FW07B. After returning home in the early 1980s, Alan drove a Porsche 935 to dominate the 1982 Australian GT Championship with sixteen wins from sixteen races. Stan and Alan, along with Graham and Damon Hill, and Keke and Nico Rosberg, are the only father/son combinations to win the Australian Grand Prix. Of the six, Stan is the only one not to be a World Driver's Champion.

Sources

1. ↑ Victoria Birth Index #/1923
2. ↑ Victoria Marriage Index #11365/1942
3. ↑ New South Wales Death Index #41279/1973

See also

• Wikipedia: Stan Jones (racing driver); accessed 7 May 2022.