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Jack Jones and his wife Sherry are pictured at a graduation party for one of his former Vallivue High School golfers in the summer of 2006.
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Greg Kilmer

Monday, August 24th, 2009

CANYON COUNTY — All Jack Jones wanted to do was start a golf program at Vallivue High School.

What he achieved was so much more.

Jones, who died Saturday at 66, after a two-year battle with cancer, served for nearly 35 years at Vallivue as teacher, coach, administrator and mentor. He left his mark at the Caldwell school.

"He was the man who got golf going at Vallivue at a time when we were really pinching pennies. There wasn't the money for us back then,'' said Bill Young, who served as Vallivue's head football coach and vice principal in 1971. "I told him he could start it but there just wasn't the money."

"But Jack was committed to golf. He got it going and then took it to the highest level.''

Along with winning the school's first-ever state basketball title, Jones led the Falcons to two state golf championships while helping develop the professional careers of Troy Vitek, Jon Stein, Buster Whitney, Scott Bendawald and current PGA Tour member Tyler Aldridge.

"He's been pretty much a father figure to me for a long, long time. He's been the greatest coach I have ever had,'' Aldridge said from a PGA Tour stop at the Wyndham Championship in Greensboro, N.C. "It's really unfortunate I won't be able to talk to him anymore about golf, about life, about anything. But he will always have a large part of my heart. I could never express just what he means to me.''

While Jones developed golf at Vallivue, he also proved his love of the game as a driving force behind the creation of the annual Canyon County Classic high school tournament at River Bend Golf Course, as well as "The Amateur," Nampa's two-day amateur tournament at the Centennial and Ridgecrest courses.

But his influence didn't stop there.

"Jack was by no means one-dimensional,'' said Young, who left Vallivue to become the head of the Idaho High School Athletic Association. "He was a real all-around person. His expertise in football, basketball and golf is unquestionable but it goes further than that. He was a tremendous administrator at Vallivue and then served as the 3rd District's secretary and was a much-respected referee later on. He was the head official for both state championship games in football and basketball. That tells you something of what coaches thought of him.''

George Scott was one of those coaches who befriended Jones, who was honored with a moment of silence before the final round of Sunday's Caldwell City Championship at Purple Sage Golf Course, Jones' home course.

"He did such a great job coaching basketball and golf at Vallivue,'' said Scott, who first met Jones while doing his student teaching at Vallivue High in 1974. "He was such a tough, tough, tough competitor. He was fierce but at the same time, he was such a good friend. A lot of us are going to miss him out here at Sage.''

• Greg Kilmer enjoyed the unique opportunity to play as a freshman on Jones' first Falcon golf team. He was also part of the program's first legacy when his son, Ryan, played for Vallivue High School in the early 1990s. He also covered the Falcon golf team for 14 years as an IPT sports reporter and long considered Jones to be a good friend.

"I know I talk for many former Falcons when I say, 'Thanks for everything, Coach. Keep hittin 'em straight.'"