Alabama: RIP Prince Albert Jones Sr.
The Montgomery Advertiser reports: Prince Albert Jones Sr. never lived more than five miles from where he was born in the rural Montgomery County community of Mathews.
A farmer by trade, the 91-year-old Jones was among the first black landowners near the town of Pike Road. He is best remembered as a mentor, a good Samaritan to countless generations of neighbors and an early voting rights pioneer.
Jones died Sunday at his country homestead surrounded by family. He was one of 15 siblings and had 15 children. ...
Morris Dees, co-founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center, said Jones was one of rural Montgomery's first registered black voters, when fewer than 1 percent of the county's black residents were registered.
"Mr. Jones was one of the area's most dedicated advocates for equality and used his good reputation with the white farming elite to help black neighbors and church members obtain the right to vote decades before the enactment of the 1965 Voting Rights Act," Dees said. -- montgomeryadvertiser.com :: Jones family celebrates life of a pioneer