Jimmy Jones, 94; Trainer of Champion Racehorses

Jimmy Jones, who trained the Triple Crown thoroughbred champion Citation and never tired of talking about the great horse’s feats for more than 50 years afterward, died Sunday at St. Francis Hospital in Marysville, Mo. He was 94.

Jones had been treated for pneumonia in May and he missed the running of this year’s Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs, where he annually watched from a lifetime box seat. It was his fringe benefit for winning the race with Citation en route to the colt’s sweep of the Triple Crown races in 1948.

The record books may show that Ben Jones, Jimmy Jones’ father, was the trainer of Citation on Derby day, but the Calumet Farm color-bearer was Jimmy Jones’ horse. He trained Citation throughout his 2-year-old year, when they won eight of nine starts, and continued on into the horse’s 3-year-old season. But Ben Jones, who was Calumet’s general manager, took over in Kentucky so that he might tie the record of saddling four Derby winners.

Jimmy Jones, reluctantly agreeing to the switch, was back in charge for the other Triple Crown wins--the Preakness at Pimlico and the Belmont Stakes in New York.

Ben Jones broke the Derby record, winning the race two more times for a total of six. Jimmy Jones won Derbys with Iron Liege in 1957 and Tim Tam in 1958. Both Joneses are members of the Racing Hall of Fame in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. Ben was elected in 1958 and Jimmy was enshrined the next year.

Jimmy Jones gave jockey Eddie Arcaro a leg up on Citation before the Derby.

“Are you sure I’m on the right horse?” Arcaro asked.

Calumet also was running Coaltown in the race.

“Just don’t get in a speed duel with my other horse,” Jones replied.

After a half-mile, Citation was second, but a full six lengths behind Coaltown.

“I just about fell out of the grandstand,” Jones said. “I thought Eddie had overreacted to my instructions. But Eddie hit Citation once with the whip and he took off, making up the difference in a sixteenth of a mile.”

The Calumet entries ran 1-2, with Citation beating Coaltown by 3 1/2 lengths.

Jimmy Jones was as much a part of the Kentucky Derby as the Louisville race’s signature blanket of roses.

In 1944, shortly before his discharge from the Coast Guard, Jones was on leave when he saw his father saddle Pensive to win the Derby.

After his retirement from training in 1964, Jones became director of racing at Monmouth Park but still was a Derby regular, evaluating the current crop of horses, always extolling the talents of Citation and casting perspectives on the history of the Triple Crown.

Citation was the eighth of 11 horses to sweep the series; Whirlaway, trained by Ben Jones in 1941, was the fifth. The last Triple Crown champion was Affirmed in 1978.

“It takes a pretty fair horse in a weak year to win all three races,” Jimmy Jones said three years ago, before Real Quiet lost the Belmont after winning the Derby and the Preakness. “I don’t even consider Whirlaway a great horse. He didn’t have great manners and might have been my dad’s best training job, but you had to set him up in a lot of races in order for him to win.

“Of the Triple Crown champions, I consider Gallant Fox, Count Fleet, Assault, Citation, Secretariat and Seattle Slew to be great ones.”

And Affirmed?

“A good horse, but the jock was the one who got him through the Triple Crown. [Steve] Cauthen outrode the other jock [Jorge Velasquez on Alydar] in all three races.”

In Jones’ opinion, there was Citation and then all the others.

“Citation was truly the best one we ever had,” Jones said. “I never saw a better one.”

Jones also saw and trained a long list of champions for Calumet Farm, an equine arsenal that included A Glitter, Armed, Barbizon, Bewitch, Coaltown, Tim Tam, Two Lea and Iron Liege. Armed was voted horse of the year in 1947 and Citation won the honor in ’48.

Ben Allyn Jones and his son Horace Allyn Jones, who had been called Jimmy since boyhood, were both born in Parnell, Mo., a tiny farming town about 100 miles northeast of Kansas City. Jimmy’s grandfather, Horace Jones, owned the town bank and raised cattle in Parnell, but Ben Jones dropped out of an agricultural college to train horses, and his son had the same bent.

Once the mayor of Parnell, Jimmy Jones worked for his father and started his own training career in 1926. Ben Jones became Calumet’s trainer in 1939, and, with his son at his side, the farm won 26 national titles, 14 for breeding and 12 for ownership.

Jimmy Jones will be buried today in Parnell, not far from his wife, Peggy, and his father. Jimmy Jones and his wife had no children. He is survived by a sister, Pauline Kneale, of Jefferson City, Mo.