Gardner Dulany Jones Jr. *60

Gardner died Nov. 2, 2020, in Raleigh, N.C., at the age of 86. After a 10-year struggle with Parkinson’s disease, he died a few days after being diagnosed with COVID-19.

Gardner was born in Nassawadox, Va. He earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the University of Virginia and a master’s degree from Princeton in 1960. With Sperry Rand in Charlottesville, Va., he worked testing gauges on nuclear submarines and joked about “sleeping between the missiles.”

In 1965 he took a position with IBM at a new lab in the Research Triangle Park. Gardner enrolled in a Ph.D. program in electrical engineering at North Carolina State University and received his doctorate in 1970.

During his 28-year career with IBM, Gardner applied his extensive knowledge of digital communications technology to do basic work in speech processing, digital data transmission, and other types of digital signal processing. A prolific inventor, he received more than 34 patent awards, published many technical papers, and received multiple awards, including Inventor of the Year for IBM in 1983.

He is survived by his wife of 61 years, Betty; son Laney Jones; daughter Mary Beth Jones; and four grandchildren.

Graduate alumni memorials are prepared by the APGA.