Anna Jones |
Ms. Jones is an award-winning, first-time documentary filmmaker. Following a corporate management career at IBM, she immersed herself in art studies at North Carolina Central University and Duke University, including the Center for Documentary Studies. Anna returned to her hometown in Northampton County, NC to audio tape a few anecdotes about her parents. In the process, she discovered a movement. This venture culminated with her researching, producing, and narrating a full length documentary film, Chairman Jones--An Improbable Leader—the incredible story of her father, Mr. James Henry Jones, a self-educated farmer who emerged as a trailblazer during the 1969 school desegregation crisis in Northampton County.
Her film explores Mr. Jones’ improbable rise from sharecropper to education leader during the Jim Crow Era, as he disregards racism and lack of education to lead the fight to end nearly a century of education inequality in Northampton. His visionary leadership as North Carolina’s first black county school board chairman introduced a new era in education and markedly advanced race relations in the State.
Anna owns and manages the family cotton and peanut farm in Northampton County where she was raised. In Durham, NC she is a member of The Southern Documentary Fund, Durham Arts Council, Duke Chapel Advisory Board, Durham Rotary Club, and Delta Sigma Theta Sorority. She holds Bachelor and Master’s degrees in Business from North Carolina Central University studied further at Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
