Ron Jones (born 1941) is an American writer and formerly a teacher in
Palo Alto, California
Palo Alto (; Spanish for "tall stick") is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto.
The city was es ...
. He is internationally known for his classroom exercise called "
The Third Wave" and the book he wrote about the event, which inspired the
made-for-TV movie
A television film, alternatively known as a television movie, made-for-TV film/movie or TV film/movie, is a feature-length film that is produced and originally distributed by or to a television network, in contrast to theatrical films made for ...
''
The Wave'' and other works, including a
theatrical film in 2008. The original TV movie won the
Emmy and
Peabody Awards. His books ''
The Acorn People'' and ''B-Ball'' have also been made into TV dramas. Jones lives in San Francisco, California where he regularly performs as a
storyteller.
Career
In April 1967, while working as a teacher at
Cubberley High School
Ellwood P. Cubberley High School (1956–1979) known locally as "Cubberley", was one of three public high schools in Palo Alto, California. The site of the closed school is now named Cubberley Community Center and used as a community center and us ...
in Palo Alto, Jones created a project with his 15-year-old World History students in which they experienced the growth of a
fascist movement, called The Wave. Jones intended for this to be only a week-long exercise. He had a designed lesson plan which included a salute, a slogan, and a secret "police" force. The experiment was ended by Jones after complaints from teachers and parents. Jones then revealed that it was an exercise intended to give students a direct experience of how easily they could be misled into behaving like fascists, drawing parallels to the rise of the
National Socialist
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...
movement in Germany.
Jones says that he was refused tenure at Cubberley High School as a result of his anti-war activities two years after the experiment. There were large student protests against this decision.
Jones has spent the past 30 years working with people with mental disabilities and has written a number of books.
Personal life
Jones was raised on 46th Avenue in the
Sunset District during the 1940s and 1950s.
He lives in the
Haight Ashbury
Haight-Ashbury () is a district of San Francisco, California, named for the intersection of Haight and Ashbury streets. It is also called The Haight and The Upper Haight. The neighborhood is known as one of the main centers of the counterculture ...
of San Francisco, with his wife Deanna. He is Jewish.
The Wave
1967 – "
The Third Wave," a classroom simulation. Jones created a week-long project for his sophomore History class at Cubberley High School in Palo Alto that was studying Nazi Germany. The experiment was designed to explore the question of how was it that the people of Germany could allow the rise of
Fascism
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy an ...
under
National Socialism
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Naz ...
and claim ignorance of the atrocities that were committed by them to neighbors and friends. Jones called the classroom experiment "The Third Wave" which simulated how a movement aimed at eliminating democracy can be created, even in a free society.
1976 – "Take as Directed", a short story by Jones about the experiment was first published in the
CoEvolution Quarterly
''CoEvolution Quarterly'' (1974–1985) was a journal descended from Stewart Brand's ''Whole Earth Catalog''. Stewart Brand founded the ''CoEvolution Quarterly'' in 1974 using proceeds from the ''Whole Earth Catalog.'' It evolved out of the o ...
(and a few years later in
"The Next Whole Earth Catalog". In the 1981 book ''No Substitute for Madness'', it was retitled "The Third Wave".
1981 – ''
The Wave'', a TV movie produced by Norman Lear's T.A.T. Communications, starring
Bruce Davison
Bruce Allen Davison (born June 28, 1946) is an American actor and director. Davison is well known for his starring role as Willard Stiles in the cult horror film '' Willard'' (1971) and his Academy Award-nominated and Golden Globe-winning perfor ...
, which appeared as an
ABC Afterschool Special.
1981 – ''
The Wave, The Classroom Experiment That Went Too Far'', a
novelization of the TV movie by
Todd Strasser (published in Europe under the pseudonym Morton Rhue).
2008 – ''
Die Welle (The Wave)'', a German film, directed by
Dennis Gansel
Dennis Gansel (born 4 October 1973) is a German film director, writer and actor .
Life and career
Gansel was born in 1973 in Hannover, West Germany, where he graduated from high school in 1993. Gansel worked in the festivals for film and televi ...
. This retelling takes place in a German classroom of 2008.
2010 – ''The Wave, A musical'' by Jones, directed by Cliff Mayotte, dramaturgy by David Ford. Performed at The Marsh in San Francisco by the Marsh Youth Theater's (MYT's) Teen Troupe.
2010 – ''Lesson Plan'', a documentary film by Philip Neel and Mark Hancock, and featuring Jones. It is distributed by Journeyman. Neel and Hancock were both original Third Wave class members. The film has won a number of awards.
2011 – ''The Third Wave'', a full length play, script by Jones and Joseph Robinette.
2019 - ''The Invisible Line'', a documentary about The Third Wave class, produced by The History Channel in Germany.
2019 - ''
We Are The Wave'', the German Netflix 6-part miniseries inspired by The Wave. This new version takes place in the present day.
Awards
* Christian Book of the Year for ''The Acorn People''
* Pulitzer nomination for ''Kids Called Crazy''
* 1985
American Book Award
The American Book Award is an American literary award that annually recognizes a set of books and people for "outstanding literary achievement". According to the 2010 awards press release, it is "a writers' award given by other writers" and "the ...
for ''Say Ray''
* ''When God Winked and Fellini Grinned'', a self-published book, was recently recommended by Oprah Winfrey on her show about autism.
Other books
*
*
*
*
*
Other movies based on Jones writings
* ''The Acorn People'', starring
Cloris Leachman
Cloris Leachman (April 30, 1926 – January 27, 2021) was an American actress and comedian whose career spanned nearly eight decades. She won many accolades, including eight Primetime Emmy Awards from 22 nominations, making her the most nomina ...
,
LeVar Burton
Levar Burton Jr. (born February 16, 1957) is an American actor, director, and television host, best known for playing Geordi La Forge in '' Star Trek: The Next Generation'' (1987–1994). He also played Kunta Kinte in the ABC miniseries ''R ...
, Ted Bessell
* ''One Special Victory'',
[https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102596/ "One Special Victory"] starring
John Larroquette
John Bernard Larroquette (; born November 25, 1947) is an American actor. He is known for his starring roles in the NBC military drama series '' Baa Baa Black Sheep'' (1976–1978), the NBC sitcom '' Night Court'' (1984–1992; for which he rec ...
Inspired by the Jones book "B-Ball" noted above.
References
External links
Ron Jones's websiteThe Cubberley Student Newspaper (the Catamount) did an interview with Ron Jones from 1969 after he left Cubberley.Ron Jones' account of The Third Wave*
The Wave HomeThird Wave info website: story history, FAQ, links, etc. by Jones' original Wave students
{{DEFAULTSORT:Jones, Ron
Living people
American male writers
Schoolteachers from California
1941 births
Writers from San Francisco
American Book Award winners