Ex-Sun photographer Jones among inductees in newspaper shrine

Thursday, Sept. 21, 2000 | 11:25 a.m.

The late Ken Jones, a longtime Las Vegas Sun photographer known for capturing celebrities on film, is among four inductees to the Nevada Newspaper Hall of Fame.

Jones, who worked for the Sun from 1954 until his retirement in 1996, will be honored posthumously at Saturday's Nevada Press Association convention at the Sunset Station hotel-casino.

Jones, who died in March at the age of 86, photographed such dignitaries as President John F. Kennedy, Eleanor Roosevelt and Elvis Presley. Jones took some of the earliest photos of Presley, including a series of the singer trying on different clothes in a Las Vegas store.

Jones was also known for his aerial photos of the Las Vegas Strip, and his column "Street Talk" that featured photos of people answering his question of the day.

Las Vegas Review-Journal columnist Ned Day will also be inducted into the Hall of Fame posthumously for his writing style that was often described as witty and irreverent.

Day, who died after collapsing on a beach in Hawaii in 1987 at the age of 42, earned a reputation as an investigative reporter with coverage of organized crime, the gaming industry and politics. Day began working for the Valley Times in 1976 and later joined the Review-Journal staff and served as managing editor of KLAS Channel 8.

The third inductee, Sue Morrow, spent 29 years beginning in 1962 as city editor of Carson City's Nevada Appeal newspaper. Among the stories she covered were President Lyndon Johnson's visit to the University of Nevada, Reno, the crash of a Paradise Airlines plane that killed 85 people near Job's Peak and the Frank Sinatra Jr. kidnapping in Lake Tahoe.

Peter Kelley is the forth inductee. He served as a combat correspondent before taking over as the editor of the Nevada Appeal from 1946 to 1953. He also worked as a state correspondent for the Reno Evening Gazette, and later spent 10 years as a Carson-area wire correspondent.