ABSTRACT
Like many other public relations counsellors who emerged in the burgeoning of public relations agencies in the wake of World War I, John Price Jones had been schooled in newspaper reporting, advertising, and had gained his public relations spurs in the promotion of Liberty Bond sales to finance the U.S. war effort. He was quick to see after two successful college fund-raising campaigns “that there may be a business in this.” Jones launched his firm, John Price Jones, Inc., on November 23, 1919, “to give counsel and service in organization and publicity to business houses, institutions of public, semi-public, and private character, and to individuals.” Jones set out to build “a business” in both fund-raising and public relations but was never able to harness the two functions effectively. Jones made his mark as a great fund-raiser, but the public relations side of the business never became a major competitor to other agencies. In the view of an early associate, Robert J. Duncan, “We got so labelled in the philanthropy field that our PR business didn’t develop.” He also saw that the two functions didn’t dovetail as neatly as Jones thought.
