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294 good, thorough training. While at Rochester, he was taken into the family of Hon. O. P. Whitcomb and wife, who cared for him until he was able to provide for himself. He came to Cleveland in 1873, after having traveled extensively through the South and West.

Mr. Jones is a thoroughly self-made man, and exact and shrewd in his business relations. The thoughtful precision and self-reliance with which he is possessed, indicate that perseverance and push were his chief instructors.

He figures prominently, not only in political but in the social and literary circles of Cleveland, and is well known throughout the state of Ohio as an earnest and intelligent advocate of race principles. He became a mason in Pioneer Lodge, No. 5, St. Paul, Minn.; was made a royal arch mason in 1877, in Cleveland, by St. John's Chapter; and in the same year was dubbed and created a knight templar in the Ezekial Commandery. He afterward withdrew from the Ezekial Commandery and entered the Red Cross, where he has proved a faithful member, giving good counsel on all questions of material interest in the lodge. He has held nearly all the important positions in these bodies, with which he has been connected, and. is now a member of the Grand Lodge and Grand Chapter of Ohio, in which he has been very active and prominent.

Mr. Jones was tendered by President Cleveland the office of minister to Liberia, but owing to his urgent duties at home, he was forced to decline the honor. Some time afterward he was appointed United States deputy marshal for the Northern District of Ohio, which position he filled with much ability and credit,

Mr. Jones is a self-made man, possessed of a strong determination to pursue to the very end anything he undertakes in the interest of. his race. He is the father of the Forest City Afro-American League of Cleveland, O., which has a