Like many people his age, Winston Jones gets up early.
As the gray light of dawn steals in through the wall of glass next to the dining table, he makes a cup of coffee and lights the first cigarette of the day. The first smoke, he knows, is always the best. Friends still badger him to give up the habit but, at 90, Jones figures it’s a little late to start worrying about that. He prefers to nurture the few vices left to him.
The house, a beautiful, ancient structure of stone and wood set on several wooded acres on Upper Bear Creek Road, is quiet. Because he lives alone, it usually is. He smokes, sips his coffee, and contemplates the day ahead.
There are not many demands on Jones’ time, these days – a hard thing for a man accustomed to an active social life. Fortunately, he has many friends in Evergreen and elsewhere who visit him, though fewer every year. Getting old is tough.
If he isn’t expecting friends, he may spend the morning at war with the dandelions that threaten his expansive front lawn. He might decide to pore over some catalogues he’s been meaning to get after, or maybe do some dusting. These old houses can get dusty quick, if you let them.
After a while, Jones, a small, slight man, rises painfully and moves into the front room. His doctor told him he is in remarkably good health for his advanced age, but this summer his arthritis is giving him trouble. It has been a pretty wet year after all, and the dampness seems to get right into his bones.
Examining the calendar, he sees that he should probably get dressed and get ready. He is giving a tour today.
For almost half a century, Jones’ home has also been the International Bell Museum, and he is its owner, curator and guide. Lovingly, painstakingly assembled over a span of almost 80 years, Jones is the proud owner of what is, in all likelihood, the largest collection of bells in the world.
Cheerfully tinkling souvenir bells and deep-throated bronze Goliaths; bells recovered from vanished civilizations and exotic bells of wood and horn gathered from distant parts of the globe; stunning creations of crystal and silver, each one a matchless example of beauty and craftsmanship. Every bell has a story about who we are and where we came from, and Jones knows every story by heart.
His unique exhibit, more than 9,000 pieces and counting, is squeezed into three rooms of his house. It is what a group is coming to see, and why Jones has to shake a leg this morning.
Justly proud of his creation, he always enjoys showing it off to an appreciative audience. It’s also nice to keep busy. When he’s busy he doesn’t have time to worry. He spends far too much time worrying, lately. He worries about his bells. He knows that a day is coming when he won’t be able to care for them, and unless he can find someone who will accept and protect his glorious achievement, the work of a lifetime will be scattered to the four winds.
Jones can recall no specific moment when he felt his destiny lay with bells, nor was there any time in his life when he aspired to have the largest collection of bells on earth. He just knew he liked them, and that was enough.
Jones first saw Evergreen in 1919, the year his father, an executive with Chrysler, built their summer home on Bear Creek. He still remembers the small tent-city the workmen erected on the lawn during construction. The result was Granite Glen, a five-bedroom manor on 36 acres of cool canyon floor. Nobody could have foreseen what the stately “cabin” would become.
As a boy growing up in Hastings, Neb., Jones was fascinated by his bicycle bell, though he can’t say precisely why. He started buying bells where he could find them, and in short order had nearly a dozen. Even then, he had rules. He only sought bells with unusual, artistic, or historical qualities. His parents, at first, dismissed his hobby as a childish whim that would fade as quickly as it began, but soon recognized the educational potential of bell collecting.
Traveling often because of his father’s work, his parents started snooping around antique shops along the East Coast, bringing home curious or beautiful bells for Jones. By the time he left Hastings to attend college in Chicago, he had amassed a respectable 750 bells.
One memorable summer in the late 1920s, he spent a summer working for Edwin Welz and his wife, Marie, at the Brook Forest Inn. Welz, a benevolent, if somewhat eccentric, Austrian, ran cattle and tourists on his 160-acre spread. After a busy season, he rewarded Jones with the bell that hung from the neck of his lead cow, a bell that now rests in a place of honor at Granite Glen.
When he wasn’t studying English and Drama, he performed with the Goodman Repertory Theater Company throughout the Midwest, and did summer stock at the Lakeshore Theater in Westport, Mass. These were opportunities to not only indulge his growing love of theater, but to mine new areas of the country for bells.
He soon moved to California, where he spent years honing his acting skills and becoming an expert makeup-artist. For the stage, he dropped the Jones and performed as Winston Howard, finding his middle name made a more distinctive surname.
He got a break, of sorts, when a show-business insider saw him appearing at the Pasadena Playhouse in “Pass the Nuts”, a popular comedy in which he portrayed a psychiatrist in a men’s asylum. At the man’s suggestion, Jones auditioned for David O. Selznick’s acting troupe.
One of five selected from more than 250 hopefuls, he spent the next few years touring California and the West. One summer, Selznick’s production company descended on Durango to film a western called The Denver and Rio Grande Railroad. Jones and other members of the crew were billeted at the regal Strater Hotel. He was delighted to discover an exquisite glass bell at a little shop just down the street. That bell now gleams from a glass case in his front room.
He became close friends with several actors who would later become prominent movie and television personalities. Among his many prized mementos of that exciting time is a program from a play he worked on at the Lobero Theater in Santa Barbara. It is signed by such talents as June Lockhart, Janet Gaynor and Harry Bratsburg, who later gained a measure of fame as Harry Morgan, best known as Col. Potter in television’s M*A*S*H.
With the outbreak of war in Europe, Jones went to work for Douglas Aircraft Co. in Santa Monica. Employed in the shipping department, he quickly rose to a position of responsibility while his collection grew to 500 bells.
On December 8, 1941, the day after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, he gave notice that he would enlist in the army at once. His supervisor was furious, but Jones was determined to wear a uniform, not a coat and tie.
After basic training, Jones was assigned to the U.S. Army Medical Corps. Within a year he had been promoted through the non-commissioned ranks to sergeant, and served as a ward-master at several army hospitals in California. Encouraged by his superiors to apply for Officer’s Candidate School and earn a commission, he declined, preferring the camaraderie of the lower ranks. Whenever he was able to obtain a Class A pass, permitting him to travel freely, he spent his time prowling antique shops and art galleries in search of bells.
As a G.I., collecting bells could be problematic. In one instance, a full Colonel stormed into his barracks to conduct an unannounced inspection. When he reached Jones’ bunk, he demanded to see the contents of his footlocker, and was dumbfounded to find the trunk completely filled with bells.
“Where,” he wanted to know, “are your clothes?”
“They’re in my buddy’s locker, sir.”
The officer stood silently for a long moment, staring at the unmilitary cache, his expression a combination of surprise, fury and bemusement. Then, perhaps confounded, he simply moved on.
From a hobbyist’s perspective, his time in the service was productive. Along with numerous smaller bells, he also procured three large ones, including the ship’s bell from the steamship Santa Rosa, a coaster that ran aground in 1910. These large bells were shipped home to his parents in Hastings, C.O.D., of course.
Discharged at the end of the war, Jones moved to Denver in 1945 and became the master of Granite Glen. He finally had a permanent home for his collection, which in this year could boast about 750 bells. The smaller ones he merely set on the stone ledges that line the rooms of the house. The six large bronze bells he now owned were installed in the spacious glade that enfolds the front of the building like a lush, green apron.
He got a job in the shipping department at Hendrie & Bolthoff, a hardware wholesaler with offices on 17th Street across from Union Station. That’s where he met Erma Swartz.
Swartz worked in the basement, keeping track of the company’s files. She loved to dance, and they soon developed a regular date schedule. One night each week they would dress up and go out on the town. Dinner at one of Denver’s better restaurants followed by a show, and then off to a nightclub to trip the light fantastic. They were married in Hastings in 1953 by Jones’ cousin, a Presbyterian minister.
His mother, who had long suffered from a heart condition, died later that same year, and his father followed just months later. His parents left him a generous trust, which they expected would sustain him comfortably for the rest of his days. The Jones’ settled into a pleasant, contented manner of living.
Jones joined the American Bell Association (ABA) in 1957. At first, he was simply curious to learn how many bell collectors there were in Colorado. He discovered that there were several, and wasted no time founding the Colorado chapter of the organization.
Membership, they say, has its privileges. The ABA, a network of bell enthusiasts that stretches across the nation and much of the world, proved to be a bonanza of superb bells. His collection quickly grew to more than 3,000 bells, and the glade in front of the house contained an impressive 50, solidly mounted, large bells of bronze, brass and iron.
The International Bell Museum was also christened in 1957. Jones consolidated his bells into two rooms of the house. He had shelving and glass cases constructed to properly display them, and began conducting tours of the marvelous exhibit during summer months.
Though Erma did not share his obsession with bells, she understood and encouraged it. She preferred to put her energies into community clubs and organizations, and became a recognized member of both Evergreen and Denver social circles. Of course, one cannot exist in such a tight orbit around Winston Jones without feeling the gravity of the bells. Erma contributed many of the museums pieces, and attended several of the ABA’s yearly conventions with her husband.
In 1962, President Kennedy proclaimed that all the large bells in the nation should be rung simultaneously each July 4th, a gesture signifying freedom, peace and unity. This appealed to Jones on many levels, but chiefly because it was an opportunity to bring the community to Granite Glen and set all those majestic bells to voice for five glorious minutes gut-wrenching pandemonium. He has continued this tradition for the last 42 years, and has no plans to abandon it.
In 1971, Erma was diagnosed with cancer. Confined to a hospital bed, her husband drove into Denver every day for almost a year to sit at her bedside and offer what comfort he could. The bills were stupendous, with a team of 10 doctors tasked to her constant care. Jones watched in helpless dismay as her condition worsened. She died on August 29, 1972.
During the long months of Erma’s illness, the trust that was intended to provide for Jones indefinitely quickly dwindled to nothing, and he was forced to sell a large portion of Granite Glen to settle hospital accounts. He still had his bells, but little else.
There were hard facts that needed to be faced. Without income from the trust, Granite Glen must be liquidated after his death. While he still owned his wonderful collection, he had no means to endow it. The immense treasure, numbering some 6,000 works of art and history, might not survive him.
Jones contacted his home town of Hastings. After lengthy negotiations, the town agreed to accept the bells as a gift, promising to preserve and display the collection in its entirety. It was not a perfect solution, but the best that Jones could expect under the circumstances. Reassured that his bells would be cared for into the distant future, he could relax and get on with life.
For the next 30 years, Jones lived quietly at his home on Upper Bear Creek. He did a couple of shows with the Evergreen Players, entertained guests from time to time, and, in 1980, joined the Elks lodge, which has been a tremendous source of comfort and companionship for him.
Attending ABA conventions was always a high point for Jones. Like a kid in a candy store, he delighted in the exotic bells offered for sale, and never failed bring several new, fascinating bells home to Evergreen.
Last year, having received no communication from Hastings in a distressingly long time, Jones contacted the town government himself, just to touch base and confirm their mutually advantageous arrangement. Hastings gently, politely, officiously pulled the rug straight out from under him. We are very sorry, he was told, but it turns out we can’t afford to take the bells after all. We meant to call and tell you. Surely you understand.
For Jones and his bells, this was a catastrophe. Despite further inquiries, but has yet to make any substantial headway in finding a new home for his spectacular legacy. While he would prefer that the collection remains in Evergreen, he is ready to donate it to any museum, library or similar institution that agrees to accept, transport, preserve and display the collection intact. Somewhere, he believes, is an institution that wants his cherished collection, if only he could locate it.
Jones now offers tours year-round. At $6 a pop, $4 for seniors, every little bit helps. He welcomes the small group of visitors into his museum. For the next two hours he escorts them through rooms bursting with every manner of ringing thing imaginable. Glass cases full of bells line walls that are, themselves, festooned with bells. Bells hang thickly from the ceiling.
He points out those of particular artistic or historical significance, like the nested camel bells from Qom, Iran, or the dinner bell that Baby Doe Tabor used to summon servants in her Denver mansion. Should a guest ask about any one of the more than 9,000 bells that the museum now contains, Jones quickly provides a detailed explanation of the item from memory. Millennia of history, culture, religion and industry are represented here.
A small, unremarkable bicycle bell, one that fascinated a small boy many long years ago, is passed by unnoticed and unmentioned, overshadowed by its more glamorous neighbors.
On their way out, the visitors take several minutes to wander through the glen, admiring the 100 large bells arrayed there, some mounted on simple wooden platforms, others suspended from elaborate stone follies. The lush grass is neatly mowed, a chore performed by lodge brothers only days before. Then they get in their car and drive away.
The work of a true collector is never done. Jones reminds himself to call that bell-maker in Pennsylvania, the one that makes those beautiful, clever bronze bells. He wants to order the one fashioned like a rooster, with a clapper shaped like a claw grasping an egg. Beautiful. And he really should get someone in here to convert that bookshelf into a bell case. There is a lot of usable space there, and Jones expects to need it. And he’s still on the lookout for a buoy bell, a hard-to-get item he’s been chasing for years.
He’ll fix a drink later, and then make dinner. It’s always good to have a cocktail before dinner, he knows. It helps you relax. For just a short while, you almost forget to worry.
Winston Jones died at home in 2006. His bells have been dispersed.