He was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and graduated from Shaker Heights High School. At Princeton, he majored in history, was a member of Dial Lodge, and roomed with Dana Friedman, Robert Clarke Ingmand, David Wagstaff, John G. Gregory, and Peter R. Harwood.

One year after graduation, David was injured in a boating accident that left him physically handicapped. Nonetheless, he graduated from the Case Western Reserve University School of Law, where he was a member of Order of the Coif, and joined the Internal Revenue Service as senior technical adviser to the director of exempt organizations.  

At David’s retirement in 2005, the IRS commissioner’s award read, “Throughout your career, your voice was heard and respected in the Congress and across the length and breadth of the exempt and philanthropic communities. You were an author, a teacher, a mentor, an inspiration, and a friend, [who was] described by a colleague as ‘the gold standard by which others were and are measured.’”

David’s sisters, Julia Jones Guroff and Elizabeth Jones Wehr; former wife, Christina Gayle Woods; and many nieces and nephews survive him. A David W. Jones ’60 Memorial Fund has been established. Contributions to the fund may be sent to Princeton University, c/o Helen Hardy, Alumni and Donor Records, P.O. Box 5357, Princeton, NJ 08543-5357.

Undergraduate Class of 1960