Most of Marcus Daly’s Bitter Root Stock Farm managers were men who lived in fine family homes in the Southside Addition along Fourth and Fifth streets. Unmarried, professional female employees typically lived with relatives or at a boardinghouse. Laura B. Jones was a notable exception. Jones started her business career as a bookkeeper at Valley Mercantile in the 1910s. She became secretary at the Bitter Root Stock Farm office in 1918, and in 1923 she purchased this Queen Anne style cottage from the Stock Farm. The home consists of two separate buildings moved from the Stock Farm circa 1909 and joined together on three lots. In addition to managing Stock Farm affairs, Jones was a partner in the Security Abstract and Title Company and co-founded the Hamilton Business and Professional Women’s Club. In 1930, when she was fifty-one, she married Herbert E. Jones, a widowed stenographer and owner of the View Acres nursery. He died suddenly in 1932, but Laura kept View Acres and her Stock Farm position until she retired in 1948. She remained in residence until her death in 1967.
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