Jerral “Jerry” Wayne Jones (born October 13, 1942) is an American billionaire businessman who has been the owner, president, and general manager of the Dallas Cowboys of the National Football League (NFL) since 1989.
The majority of Jones’s fortune is derived from his ownership of the Dallas Cowboys, the National Football League franchise he purchased in 1989 for a then-record $150 million, Jones said. The team is valued based on an August 2022 analysis by valuation consultants Sportico. Jones owns the whole team and is believed to hold no debt in the organization, according to Peter J. Schwartz, a New York-based valuation consultant.
Jones owns 66% of Comstock Resources, according to the company’s 2023 proxy statement.
The value of his cash and other assets is based on information provided a person familiar with the holdings who asked not to be named because the holdings are private. These assets include land owned through a series of entities named Blue Star, a stake in Legends Hospitality Management, and a number of Papa John’s franchises.
A spokesperson for the Dallas Cowboys declined to comment on Bloomberg’s net worth calculation for the billionaire.
Biography
Jones was born in Los Angeles, California, to John “Pat” and Armenita Jones. The family moved back to North Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1945. His parents owned two branches of Pat’s Super Market in the Rose City neighborhood of North Little Rock. Jones was a running back at North Little Rock High School, graduating in 1960.
After his graduation, Jones’ parents moved to Springfield, Missouri, where Pat was president and chairman of Modern Security Life Insurance Co. The company, which an advertisement billed as a “one in a million” company, saw its assets increase from $440,299.76 in its first statement in 1961 to $6,230,607 in 1965. After graduating from the University of Arkansas, Jerry W. Jones was listed as an executive vice president. With the success of the company, the Joneses assembled the 5,500-acre Buena Vista Ranch east of Springfield in Rogersville, Missouri, in the Ozark Mountains. In 1971, after selling the insurance company, the couple carved out 400 acres of their ranch to start Buena Vista Animal Paradise, where tourists could visit exotic animals (now Wild Animal Safari in Strafford, Missouri, just south of Interstate 44).
College football career
Jones attended the University of Arkansas, where he was a member of the Kappa Sigma fraternity. He was co-captain of Arkansas’ 1964 national championship football team. He was an offensive lineman for College Football Hall of Fame coach Frank Broyles and a teammate of college football and NFL coach Jimmy Johnson, whom Jones hired as his first head coach after purchasing the Cowboys.
Other notable teammates were Glen Ray Hines, a consensus All-American offensive tackle; Ken Hatfield, who went on to coach several major programs including Arkansas; Jim Lindsey; future Outland Trophy winner Loyd Phillips; and College Football Hall of Fame linebacker Ronnie Caveness. Several future head coaches were assistant coaches for Broyles on the Razorbacks‘ staff during Jones’ college career in Fayetteville, including three more members of the College Football Hall of Fame: Hayden Fry (Southern Methodist University, North Texas State University, and the University of Iowa); Johnny Majors (Iowa State University, University of Pittsburgh, and the University of Tennessee), and Barry Switzer (University of Oklahoma, and later head coach of the Cowboys under Jones).
Jones is one of a very small number of NFL owners who had a significant level of success as a football player.
Milestones
- 1942 Jerral “Jerry” Jones is born. He grows up in North Little Rock, Arkansas.
- 1965 Graduates from University of Arkansas with undergraduate and graduate degrees.
- 1966 Reaches deal to buy San Diego Chargers, then backs out.
- 1989 Purchases Dallas Cowboys for then-record price of $140 million.
- 1992 Cowboys win first of three Super Bowls under Jones.
- 2004 Enters joint venture with Papa John’s for Texas pizza franchises.
- 2009 Opens new Cowboys venue, AT&T Stadium, in Arlington, Texas.
- 2015 Begins constructing Gates of Prosper, a planned 1,500 home community.
Business ventures
According to an interview with Jones on HBO, after graduating from college in 1965, he borrowed a million dollars from Jimmy Hoffa‘s Teamsters union to open up a string of Shakey’s Pizza Parlor restaurants in Missouri. When that venture failed, Jones was given a job at his father’s insurance company, Modern Security Life of Springfield, Missouri. He received his master’s degree in business in 1970. After several other unsuccessful business ventures (including an attempt, again using Teamsters money, to purchase the American Football League‘s San Diego Chargers in 1967), he began an oil and gas exploration business in Arkansas, Jones Oil and Land Lease, which became successful. His privately held company currently does natural resource prospecting.
In 2008, Jones formed a partnership with Yankee Global Enterprises to create Legends Hospitality, a food, beverage, merchandise, retail, and stadium operations corporation serving entertainment venues.
