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|  | 'Run Run' personified Raiders
« Thread Started on Dec 20, 2006, 7:50pm » | |
![[image]](http://static.flickr.com/139/325203845_3513fcaaf1.jpg)
http://www.insidebayarea.com
Column by Dave Newhouse
Inside Bay Area
12-20-06
THE OAKLAND Raiders once won with character, and characters. While the team desperately soul-searches for character these days, the last of its true characters slipped away this past weekend.
George "Run Run" Jones died of a heart attack at the team's Alameda offices Saturday. He was 77, and all that running wore out his heart.
"Run Run" was the NFL's, and likely the world's, oldest ball boy, hurrying as fast as his aging legs would carry him to hand out towels and liquid refreshment to Raider players during timeouts.
He loved the Raiders, he loved his job, and he showed up daily at the team's practice facility even though officially retired. "Run Run" died doing what he loved most, at the place he felt was home.
He first went to work for the Raiders in 1963, the same year Al Davis arrived in Oakland, and they watched the franchise flourish together. "Run Run" was the Raiders' MVG — Most Valuable Gopher.
Whatever the team needed done immediately, such as shuttling players to and from the airport, "Run Run" was Georgie on the spot. No request was asking too much, and no amount of working hours was insulting.
"Run Run" also was the Raiders' unofficial ambassador, greeting fans wherever the team traveled, joining them in a libation, and spreading the good word of the Silver and Black even in such troubling times as the present.
He was part of the Raiders legacy, and he was proudest of that legacy when his son Tom joined him in the towel-and-liquid distribution process. It was a passing of the torch, or the Gatorade, or whatever.
"Run Run" leaves behind Tom and a daughter, Wendy, and another proud, but hidden, history that "Run Run" was reluctant to discuss. For in spite of his gregarious public persona, he was the silent hero.
"Run Run" Jones was a prisoner of war. The Navy shipped him to Korea in 1951, in the heart of that conflict. He was subsequently captured.
"I never knew if I would be alive from one day to the next," he said of that harrowing experience. "If they decided to shoot you, that was it. I did what I was supposed to do. I was scared to death.
"I lost about 35 pounds as we were eating mostly rice. It was 15 below zero, and we weren't dressed nearly warm enough, but they had us outside digging graves. There were some turncoats. But I wanted to get home, and this kept me going."
It's doubtful any of the current Raiders know his heroic story, which had to be dragged out of him. He was from a generation that buried grisly war memories internally.
Before Korea, "Run Run" was stationed in Oxnard, where he went roller skating for the very first time. A movie company spotted him and used him as an extra in the Mickey Rooney film "Fireball," a Roller Derby takeoff.
After Korea, "Run Run" spent 18 years in real-life Roller Derby. He was a Bay Bomber from 1954 to 1961. He credited Dick Lane, a boxing and wrestling announcer in Los Angeles, with thinking up his lasting nickname.
"Because I could run on my skates," "Run Run" explained. "Not too many could do it."
"Run Run" took umbrage with accusations that Roller Derby matches were fixed. He had the broken body parts — shoulder, collarbone, tailbone, ribs — to prove his point, not to mention water on the knee, torn ankle ligaments, and a couple dozen lost toenails from being kicked during matches.
The Raiders used to have a patent on characters: "The Snake," "The Mad Stork," "The Assassin," "The Tooz" and "Dr. Death." But "Run Run" stood alone. He was literally hell on wheels, and he had escaped death at the point of a bayonet. Without elaboration.
"He was a classic," ex-Raiders linebacker Phil Villapiano said. "He had a following. He was a celebrity. I just enjoyed him. He was nice to everybody, tried so hard, never missed a practice. I thought he was 70 when he was 50."
Well, "Run Run" had white hair by his 40s. But although his gait had slowed, and his busted-up knees grew knobbier with age, don't fool yourself, he had some Roller Derby moves left. He still chased after the ladies.
"I'd catch them, too," he said not long ago in his gruff voice.
"Run Run" was a character with character. A celebration of his colorful, courageous life is scheduled for 2 p.m. Friday at the Oakland Hilton.
![[image]](http://www.freewebs.com/illinoisrollerderby/george%20run%20run%20jones%202.jpg)
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