Person Sheet

Name James Covington NEWTON Birth 20 Jan 1935, Big Rapids, MI Death 10 Feb 2003, Williams, OR Occupation Clock Repairman, Inventor Education Big Rapids High School 1953 w. honors; Orange Coast College Religion agnostic Father Roy NEWTON Ph.D. (1904-1974) Mother Dorothy Vernon CRAMMOND (1905-1981)
Spouses:
1 Orsola Blanche MARNEY Birth 21 May 1927, New Mexico Death 22 Feb 2005, Grants Pass, OR Occupation Housewife Education completed 8th grade(?) Religion Christian Father Homer Melvin MARNEY Mother Bertha HAWKINS
Children: James Michael (1964-)

Dad was a good man in most ways and a bad man in just a few. He told me "If you aren't pissing off 10% of the population, you aren't doing anything worth while." Of course, he also said "Son: Sincerity is the KEY. If you can fake that, you've got it made." He was an excellent electro-mechanical engineer with many interesting devices to his name. His finest legacy is in the form of two perfect live steam train engines, both 4-8-4 Northerns. One standard guage and one O-guage. Both have been fired and run on propane although they were more often run on compressed air from tank cars, pulled behind, made from converted propane bottles. These engines were made, not from kits, but from scratch in his machine shop over many years.

1935 – Birth and Death in the Newton Family by Glen Edward Newton - the story of James Covington Newton's birth and Luther Samuel NEWTON death on the same weekend in 1935.

JC and his brother Glen singing with a recording of Glen playing the piano and Orsola singing the chorus of a hymn.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMEJXFCGRHI

This picture was probably taken on the front steps of Grandma Crammond’s house in Lansing. [Glen] hadn’t been born yet, and Dave and Jim were around 9 and 11. {Dorothy on the left, Grandma Crammond right, Dave center top, and Jim front}

David and Jim taken in the summer of 1941 by height markers on the garage. You can see that Jim had reached 4 ft. tall and David was about 3’ 5-1/2” tall.

July 1949 Jimmy, Dorothy, Dave in the back and Perry B, Eva, Charles E in the front.

JIm with the movie camera he made from cardboard, toilet paper or paper towel tubes, erector set parts, and optics from Edmund Scientific. The cardboard was soaked in glue and layers of paint to strengthen and protect it. The electric motor had a rheostat for manual speed control. It did work and did produce very respectable films.

James C Newton at graduation time with old 1938 Ford

Accomplishments of James C. Newton +

1966 Oct 23 Letter from Roy to James Covington