100% Typical Culture / Portfolio check with Bart Jones.

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Name, Age, Status, Employer, Hometown?

Bartholomew Wilhelm Jones, 28, Single as Fuck!, The Skateboard mag son!, Geneva, Illinois.

Lets start at the very beginning. I want to know what it took to spawn you. Tell me about your parents. What kind of people were they, what did they do, how were you conceived?

Whoa!! That’s deep. Shit, I don’t know. My dad I think was originally from Plainfield, Illinois a little like cornfield town that’s all big now. He went to like private Catholic schools or something, but he’s not like religious or anything, he keeps it real. An my mom is originally from Germany an actually lived in Israel for a minute when she was a child too, but then I think shit was rough over there, so her fam got hooked up with a boat ride to the states an started living in St. Louis, I think maybe.. Moving on, Dad went to college in St. Louis met my mom, badda boom batta bing, got married an made me.. I question if they were on some sort of drugs at the time, because I’m pretty jacked. My mom has had a lot of odd jobs through the years from school teacher, to running an antique store, to working in real estate and my dad used to run a chain of record stores called Apple Tree Records, which was an awesome time, because until I was about 16, my dad could hook up any music for free, plus free tickets to just about anything, I wish he still had that goin’ but due to the likes of Best Buy, an Circuit city, an places like that; Apple Tree went under. I went around with my family to all the stores to close them down which sucked, but I came up on a lot of goods. Now my dad runs a Play It Again sports, so pretty much my mom an dad go around to auctions an garage sales an stock up on used sports equipment, so we use to have a lot of music laying around the house, but now it’s sport’s equipment.

Bart Blunt Fakies at the Santa Cruz park, Photo: Buzzy Sullivan


Michael Tubbs, Front Smith.

Lets move on to your childhood. Any traumatic evens that still haunt you today?
I don’t think anything from my childhood still haunts me in anyway, but yea sure.. I’ve had a bunch of those.. I almost blew our families new puppies head off with a Draino bomb, my baby sitter tried to have sex with me once, I don’t know, but yea I was definitely a fucked up kid, still pretty much am.


Ben Smith, Ollie up Wallie Santa Ana.

What was your very first encounter with skateboarding? When did you know that this was going to be a long term relationship?
First encounter I probably don’t remember, but I know I was super hyped on it when I seen these dudes skating flatground and ollieing over these road barriers at this downtown festival we have where I lived called “Swedish Days”. All the dudes had like two different colored Airwalk shoes on with duct tape, painter hats, all flaired out an shit, I remember just thinking “These dudes are bad ass, that’s how I want to be!” Around the same time I was always psyched if I could catch “Skate TV” on Nickelodeon. Obviously totally clueless about skateboarding, but nonetheless, super hyped. I didn’t actually start skating until a few years after that, when a skate shop opened by my house called Rich’s, which is funny to think of, because the place was such a fuckin’ circus, but I would just skate around the shop an to me that was the most bad ass thing ever at the time. Funny thing is, one of those dudes that I seen skating a long time ago at the festival is now my good homey Steve Davenport, he still skates, still rips!! But Yea, I really never knew it was going to be a long term relationship.. I guess I just really never got into anything else. When it comes to anything else relatively athletic I’m full on goonbat panzy steez. I remember when some of the kids in high school were getting into other things like Golf, Cars, ETC… I didn’t really understand. I just remember thinking “that shit’s fucking gay, you don’t wanna go skating?!” I went through a little phase when I was going to art school, where I wasn’t really into skating, I didn’t know what was really going on, didn’t see the magazine’s and new vids; at that time I was more interested in becoming a “fine artist” but I’m kind over that I guess.

What was your very first encounter with skateboarding? When did you know that this was going to be a long term relationship?

First encounter I probably don’t remember, but I know I was super hyped on it when I seen these dudes skating flatground and ollieing over these road barriers at this downtown festival we have where I lived called “Swedish Days”. All the dudes had like two different colored Airwalk shoes on with duct tape, painter hats, all flaired out an shit, I remember just thinking “These dudes are bad ass, that’s how I want to be!” Around the same time I was always psyched if I could catch “Skate TV” on Nickelodeon. Obviously totally clueless about skateboarding, but nonetheless, super hyped. I didn’t actually start skating until a few years after that, when a skate shop opened by my house called Rich’s, which is funny to think of, because the place was such a fuckin’ circus, but I would just skate around the shop an to me that was the most bad ass thing ever at the time. Funny thing is, one of those dudes that I seen skating a long time ago at the festival is now my good homey Steve Davenport, he still skates, still rips!! But Yea, I really never knew it was going to be a long term relationship.. I guess I just really never got into anything else. When it comes to anything else relatively athletic I’m full on goonbat panzy steez. I remember when some of the kids in high school were getting into other things like Golf, Cars, ETC… I didn’t really understand. I just remember thinking “that shit’s fucking gay, you don’t wanna go skating?!” I went through a little phase when I was going to art school, where I wasn’t really into skating, I didn’t know what was really going on, didn’t see the magazine’s and new vids; at that time I was more interested in becoming a “fine artist” but I’m kind over that I guess.

Being from Illinois, what are your thoughts on Barack Obama?

Being totally fried, I don’t really pay much attention to that kind of stuff, but I’m for sure down for Obama. I remember when he was running for senator or whatever in Illinois, an there were all these billboards with him, an I said to my dad “look at this dude looking all pimp an shit” an he told me “that’s the man that’s expected to be the first black president”. Then in my photo journalism class I was assigned to go shoot photos of Barack’s victory speech. An like any other sucker, I was just eating it up; Obama just speaks with such like.. I don’t even know! Power, I guess, an then just looking around at all the people being so happy, it was just good vibes all around. An now it’s like the same thing again, but the whole country. I’m for sure pumped that at one time I lived in the same city as Obama. It’s a pretty exciting time, but what do I know..?

Who are some og skate homies from Illinois?

We used to have the Geneva Crew….
James Wilschke, Peter Sutfin, Justin Ward, Tim Ward, Ben Smith, Chris Smith, Tim Armour, Ryan Roullete, Steve Davenport, Brad Rogers, Chris Fetter, Chris Poquette, ELG, Tom Gallagher, Aaron Feltgen, and probably some more, I forgot, but yea we had a skate house an all, really amazing times, but the crew has been broken up quite a bit since then, but still exists in some sort of way.