Del "Abe" Jones (The Poor Man's Poet) was born in Indio, California in 1941. He served in the USAF '58-'61 at Fairchild AFB, WA in the 92nd Combat Defense Squadron, K9 Corps. He has four children and eight grandchildren and three great grandchildren who reside in Washington State. He worked in the sheet metal industry on Disney World and other large projects around the Country. After a disastrous three story fall on a construction project in Tacoma in 1974 he began doing Cad HVAC design work. He retired from the trade in 2003. He began writing poetry in the early eighties and has self-published four books. He donated profits from "The World, War, Freedom, And More" to the families of Tennessee National Guardsmen who fought in Desert Storm. He has had additional poems published in various publications around the country as well as reading and being interviewed on television and radio. He was asked to recite "The Wall", a poem he wrote about the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, D.C. at the dedication of the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial in Orlando, Florida. Two of his poems are etched on the Ellis County Veteran's Memorial in Waxahachie, Texas, dedicated Veteran's Day, 2002 .Pics at http://www.rootsweb.com/~txellis/photos/veterans.htm His poem, "The Never Ending Trail" about the Cherokee Trail Of Tears has been used in classrooms across the Nation and abroad. It has also been published in "TO BE READ ALOUD" > http://www.tobereadaloud.org/selections.html He came to Nashville in 1984 hoping to write song lyrics but now just composes and posts his poetry to share with others.