The audio quality is terrible, the storyteller is old and frail, his voice sometimes garbled when he recorded these, but a set of crumbling old cassette tapes Bill Jones let me borrow of his dad J.B. Jones’ just might be one of the most historically valuable finds I’ve come across in my dozen years of historical motorcycle racing research.

J.B. Jones bio from an early-1950s motorcycle racing book.

J.B. Jones’ racing legacy has largely been lost to history. The era of his racing career, which spanned from the 1920s through the 1940s, is perhaps one of the least documented periods of motorcycle racing in America. But these tapes hold a treasure-trove of information from that era. Everything from details on the motorcycles raced, how they were tuned, the tracks, how early Class C riders backed by the factory skirted the rules of private ownership, what travel was like in those days, where riders stayed, life between races, the pay they earned and on and on. The details are as rich as anything I’ve heard before.

Born in Oklahoma in 1906, J.B. Jones grew up in Dallas and became one of the leading motorcycle racers of the 1930s and ‘40s. His accomplishments include winning the AMA National T.T. Championship a total of five times, 1936 and 1938-1941. He was runner up in the inaugural Peoria TT National in 1947. Jones also won both Texas and Indiana State Championships during his career.

During the late 30’s and early 1940s Jones was a factory-supported rider with Harley-Davidson. Many riders of the era called J.B. Jones the best T.T. racer of his time. His record on TT courses was the nation’s best of the late 1930s and early 40s.

Jones lived in Marion, Indiana, during his prime racing years. After racing he worked for years in motorcycle dealerships in the St. Louis area, where he lived until he died in 1980.

I’d been searching for info on Jones for years. Being listed as a rider from Marion, Indiana, who’d won nationals, Jones naturally piqued my interest. But several trips to Marion yielded old newspaper features on him, but little else. Only one elderly area rider I found through a local dealership knew Jones and said the last he knew he moved away from Marion in the 1950s and didn’t know where he ended up. With the common last name of Jones it would be nearly impossible to chase down survivors.

I managed to find an old racing book that had a mini-bio on Jones and found out through it that he had three sons. Then a breakthrough came when I was interviewing Indianapolis racer Dan Ingram. Dan happened to know Bill Jones, J.B.’s son. A quick call to Bill up in Marion and just like that I had my source of information on the long lost J.B. Jones.

Before I went up to visit Bill he warned me that the paperwork he had on his dad was thin – a few old articles from Harley-Davidson’s Enthusiast magazine and various other clippings. Bill and I talked for several hours and it was only just before I left that he mentioned that his dad had recorded some old tapes telling his life story in hopes that someone might do a book on him someday. My jaw nearly hit the floor when Bill handed me a dozen or so cassettes his dad had recorded on an early home cassette recorder in the 1970s. I was eager to hear what was on the tapes. Bill said he’d never listened to them, partly because he was afraid to, owing to the poor condition of the old tapes.

When I got home I crossed my fingers and slipped the first tape into the deck. I was thrilled that there was indeed audio and it was at least usable. Then I started listening to the stories and began to realize just how thoroughly J.B. had detailed motorcycle racing from the 1920s to the 1950s.

I am in the process of digitizing and trying to clean up the audio the best I can. It is very difficult to hear and understand what is being said on these fragile old tapes that are close to 40 years old. Fortunately the technology to clean up the sound digitally is quiet amazing.

The excerpt you’ll hear on this portion of audio was barely audible as I listened to it directly from the original tape, but with digital enhancements Jones’ story of early Peoria becomes much clearer. In some instances his heavy Texas drawl and frailty of his voice still make it a little difficult to understand, but listen carefully and you’ll hear Jones tell a great story of the first national at Peoria as he battles with eventual winner Herman Dahlke. He later describes what the original Peoria TT track was like when it was first raced on in 1942, pre-dating the national there, and apparently much more rough-hewn than it is today.

Eventually I hope to clean up the audio and give a CD of Jones’ recordings to his son Bill, the Motorcycle Hall of Fame, the Barber Museum and perhaps even some libraries in Dallas, since he talks a lot about his childhood and what life was like in Dallas during the 1910s and ‘20s.

J.B. Jones describes the first TT National at Peoria in 1947, the purse and what the track was like when it was first opened in 1942.