Daughter of Fay Jones honors family with $500,000 and AIA Gold Medal gifts

FAYETTEVILLE – University of Arkansas alumna Jean Cameron “Cami” Jones, a daughter of Fay and Gus Jones, is honoring her parents with two gifts to the Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design at the U of A.
Cami, the younger of the Joneses’ two daughters, has committed a $500,000 planned gift to establish the Fay and Gus Jones Legacy Endowment in Architecture and Design. This endowment is intended to provide funding for publications, exhibitions and other events in the Fay Jones School that extend the legacy of its namesake, Fay Jones.
In honoring her parents, she aims to celebrate the architect her father was and spotlight the workhorse her mother was to keep the household running. She wants to ensure that Fay Jones is remembered as an architect, teacher and father, and that Gus Jones is remembered for her part in raising the couple’s two daughters, managing their home and supporting Fay in his career in immeasurable ways.
Cami, with her sister, Janis Jones, also donated the Gold Medal awarded to Fay Jones in 1990 by the American Institute of Architects. The Gold Medal is AIA’s highest annual honor, recognizing individuals whose work has had a lasting influence on the theory and practice of architecture.
Cami, who lives in Fayetteville, earned a Bachelor of Science in Education and a Master of Education, both with an emphasis in elementary education, from the College of Education and Health Professions at the U of A. She was also a member of Chi Omega at the U of A. She is retired from the Texas Education Agency, where she was the director of early childhood education. She recently moved back to Fayetteville after living and working in Houston for 12 years and then Austin for 36 years.
“Upholding and sustaining the legacy of Fay Jones and his work is of undeniable importance to our school, to our identity and our mission,” said Peter MacKeith, dean of the Fay Jones School. “But this is also a legacy of a family, both parents and children, devoted to the culture of the state, region and nation. Cami Jones’ gifts to the school to sustain that deep legacy are of superlative value and are a true cause for celebration among all who are devoted to the school and our larger mission in architectural education. On behalf of the school, thank you Cami!”
“Fay Jones’ influence on architecture is undeniable, and the impact of his work continues to resonate today, but none of it would have been possible without the steadfast support of his wife, Gus,” said Chancellor Charles Robinson. “By honoring both of her parents with this generous gift, Cami Jones ensures that their shared legacy will continue to inspire University of Arkansas students for generations to come.”
A native Arkansan, Fay Jones attended the earliest architecture classes offered at the University of Arkansas, in the architecture program founded by John G. Williams. Fay Jones graduated in the first class of architecture students, and eventually returned to teach for 35 years and serve as the school's first dean. In his professional practice, he designed 135 houses and 15 chapels and churches across the country, but most were in Arkansas.
“We are immensely grateful to Cami Jones for generously supporting the Fay Jones School,” said Scott Varady, vice chancellor for university advancement. “Her gift is a moving tribute to the values and vision her parents brought to the world of architecture and will have a profound effect on architectural innovators and those who experience the spaces they create. The family legacy will continue to inspire and guide generations of students.”
In the years since her father’s death in 2004 at age 83 and her mother’s death in 2014 at age 92 — Cami has reflected on her parents’ lives and careers, recalling details of their early years and some big, and small, memorable moments.
“I realize how fortunate I am to have had my parents,” she said.
Fay had three jobs and was helping to raise two daughters while working his way through college — first at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville, then at Rice University in Houston, Texas.
His office was in the ground level of their home before he used a couple of spaces along Dickson Street. He eventually moved it to the top floor of the Underwood Building he designed.
“My father would have never been able to do what he did. He did all this without hiring a secretary. He didn’t hire Mother either,” she said. “She just did everything for everybody and kept it going.”
Gus would entertain in their home on Hillcrest Avenue on Razorback home football game weekends. The games were usually in the afternoon, long before the stadium was equipped with nighttime lighting. After attending the game, everyone would meet at the Jones House for a meal — typically Gus’ homemade lasagna.
Cami recalls sitting around and listening to everyone’s stories. Many of Fay’s clients were good friends before they worked together, or a friendship was formed through their collaboration.
Fay designed the family’s home in the 1950s, incorporating a boulder into the space that was Fay’s office on the ground floor. Gus took care of plants at the house, planting ivy around their house and on the neighboring lot they owned, and installed ferns along a rock wall. She also added plants on and around the boulder, making it a garden room. She meticulously maintained the plants.
“Talk about tender loving care — you would never, ever see a brown leaf on anything,” Cami said.
When Fay had a heart attack just before his 54th birthday, Gus got an American Heart Association cookbook to make meals from. He cooperated with the dietary guidelines but still insisted on bacon for a BLT.
Gus would later take care of Fay, when he developed Parkinson’s disease. With the additional help of caregivers, Fay was able to stay in their home until his death.

When her dad found out he was one of three finalists being considered to receive the AIA Gold Medal, he doubted he’d be selected, Cami said. He had a small practice in mid-America, while the other finalists were part of large firms. But he sent in his work, as requested, including framed photos and written descriptions.
In character, Fay didn’t simply pack his work in standard crates to ship. He designed his crates with detailed handles with scoring. Inside, beautifully crafted boxes contained his work.
Cami recalls the week of activities — now 35 years ago — that surrounded her father receiving the AIA Gold Medal in Washington, D.C. It started with the unveiling of his name after it was chiseled into the granite Wall of Honor in the lobby of the AIA headquarters building. Cami said her father was concerned his name would be misspelled. Though he’d been using E. Fay Jones at the time, he was worried that Fay would be set in stone as “Faye” — a common misspelling of his name. He was greatly relieved at the unveiling.
“That was just the beginning of it,” she said.
Then, in a ceremony at the White House in the early afternoon of February 22, 1990, President George H.W. Bush made remarks before awarding Fay Jones the Gold Medal.
“Through humble materials and simple forms, Mr. Jones has created architecture of great power and space. His reverence for the land and his respect for the inner needs of the people who visit or dwell in his buildings give his architecture rare beauty and dignity,” President Bush said.
That evening, a gala was held at the National Building Museum. Peter Jennings, the late television news anchor, served as the emcee, and then-Prince Charles of Wales made remarks. Cami was star-eyed at the celebrities in attendance.
After the ceremony, Fay didn’t take off his Gold Medal — and he even wore it to bed that night. He only removed it to shower, she said.
Cami said a journalist interviewing Fay at the time asked him what he was going to do differently once he returned to his practice in Fayetteville.
Fay told them, “‘I think I’m just going to stick with what brought me here. I really don’t see any changes,’” Cami said.
True to his word, Fay and his family returned to their regular life after the week of celebrations in Washington, D.C. For several weeks, a few local restaurants insisted the family’s meals were on the house. One restaurant kept that pledge until Fay’s death.
Cami and her sister, Janis, have previously contributed funds to the U of A to honor and mark the legacy of their parents. The sisters gave money to have the fourth-floor conference room of Vol Walker Hall, home to the Fay Jones School, named for their mother, Mary Elizabeth “Gus” Jones, in 2017. In 2018, Cami committed a planned gift of more than $1 million to benefit the Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design and University Libraries. That gift was directed toward preserving the family home, supporting a visiting lecturer or professor of design, and digitizing portions of the Fay Jones Collection in Special Collections.
Cami is a life member of the Arkansas Alumni Association and included in the Towers of Old Main, a giving society for the university’s most generous benefactors.
Once she and Janis are gone, Cami wants to ensure that someone else can continue to tell the stories. She’s very aware that she’s been a keeper of the stories. Some are poignant now, and some still make her laugh.
“It’s nice to remember. And when I remember one thing, it reminds me of a story that’s connected to it,” Cami said. “I just wish Daddy were here to tell the stories because he was a real storyteller. Also, you did have to watch his face, because his facial expressions were as good as whatever he was telling you.”
In her mother’s later years, Cami helped her with finances and bookkeeping. Caring for their family’s legacy is the “closest thing I have to being close to her,” Cami says of Gus.
Another story Cami tells is the one in which Gus presented remarks and accepted Fay’s final AIA honor, the Twenty-five Year Award for Thorncrown Chapel, given to him posthumously in 2006. Made of glass, stone and steel, this chapel in the woods of Eureka Springs was Jones’ first chapel commission and propelled him to international stature. The chapel received an AIA Honor Award in 1981 and was ranked fourth on the AIA’s list of the top 10 buildings in the 20th century.
In February 2006, Gus was again at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., for the gala event. Cami recalls her mother’s new gray jacket that matched the gray in her hair.
“She got up there, and she did the best job,” Cami said. “Nobody could do anything like Fay could. She did it, and she looked so pretty.”