Jordan family papers

Riverda Harding Jordan

1873 Apr 12 -

R.H. Jordan was born April 12, 1873, in St. Joseph, and was prepared at the Central High School in that city. In college he received first dispute appointments and "also ran" with the track squad.

From 1893 to 1895 he was cashier for the R. Douglas Crockery Company, St. Joseph. Then for one year each he was associated with Johnson, Rusk & Stringfellow, lawyers of St. Joseph, and with the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad in that city. He then turned to educational work and has since been engaged in teaching. From 1897 to 1902 he was head of the department of mathematics at the Central High School, St. Joseph, and from 1902 to 1904 head of the department of Latin and Greek; during this entire period he was also director of athlectics and gymnasium instructor. In 1904 he was appointed principal of the High School and director of the Normal Training School and held this position until 1911 when he was appointed principal of West High School in Minneapolis. This latter post he resigned in June, 1917, and in Septmeber he was appointed teaching assistant in the Department of Rhetoric at the University of Minnesota and instructor in business English in the School of Agriculture. He has entered the Graduate School and is working on educational administration in the College of Education. He has been appointed instructor in the Department of Rhetoric for the year 1918-1919. He is also conducting correspondence courses in secondary education and rural education in the University Extension Department.

In 1913 he received the degree of M.A. at Yale. While connected with the Missouri schools he was elected in 1901 secretary of the Northwest Missouri Teachers' Association, was president of the Missouri Valley Atheletic Association, president of the Northwest Inter-High School Association, 1909-1911, treasurer of the Missouri State Teachers' Association, 1902-04, vice-president of the Missouri Society of Sciences and Mathematics, secretary of the Missouri Classical Society, 1908-11, and a member of the City Teachers' Examining Board, 1904-11. In April, 1912, he was elected Chairman of a committee of the Minneapolis Schoolmasters' Club to confer with employers and representatives of labor on the best methods of bringing employees and the public schools into closer relationship. He has presented a number of papers before these associations most of which were later published in the Proceedings of the Missouri State Teachers' Association and in educational reports, including the National Educational Association and Southern Educational Association Proceedings. He has also contributed to such educational journals as the Journal of Education, Boston, and others. He compiled and published the "Handbook of the Missouri Valley Interscholastic Association" in 1910. He was editor of the Educational Section of the Western Home Journal,1909-1911.

War work: He was captain of the Graduate School in the Second Liberty Loan Drive; assisted in giving and scoring psychological tests to second O.T.C. At Fort Snelling; these tests were made the official government intelligence tests for selection of officers in all training camps. Is a member of War Savings Society of the College of Engineering, and has done salvage work in connection with the Red Cross.

In 1919 Jordan was appointed Professor of Education at Dartmouth. In that same year he received the degree of Ph.D. From University of Minnesota, and was elected president of the Bi-State Educational Club, including the schools of Vermont and New Hampshire.

Dartmouth gave him an honorary M.A. in 1921, and he published his book "Nationality and School Progress" in that year.

He became professor of Education at Cornell in 1921, and Chairman of the Cornell Summer Session, 1923. He retired as Professor Emeritus, July 1, 1941. During his service at Cornell he held many offices. In 1924-25 he was member of the New York CitySurvey Committee; in 1930 he was elected president of the National Association of Summer Session Directors; in 1931 he was made a member, and in 1932 Chairman of the National Interfraternity Conference Committee on Scholarship; he served as Chairman of the Men's Board of Directors, Cornell United Religious Work. For ten years he was member of the New York State Examinations Board.

His published writings include: "Education as a Life Work," Century Company, 1931; "Educational Measurements and the Classroom Teachers" with Gilliland and Freeman, Century Company, 1931.

He was married August 3, 1909, in St. Joseph, to Mary Vinette, daughter of George H. Hoover, a merchant, and Barbara Ann (Bechtel) Hoover. They have two sons, both born in Minneapolis: Richard Hollister, born September 21, 1911, and Hoover Harding, born September 13, 1913.

Extracted from History of the Class of Eighteen Ninety-Three, Twenty-five year record and fiftieth anniversary.

For additional biographical information, see reunion volumes for the class of 1893.

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Loring Kenneth Jordan

1888 Nov 1 -

Our request for his history since 1919 brought the following response from Jordan: "There is only one answer to this question, WORK and more WORK. Most of 1910 was spent in graduate work at Sheff. After a few months in ranch experience in Idaho, my residence was entirely in engineering and construction on hydraulic and hydroelectric projects as assistant engineer and engineer for various concerns; among them were – H.M. Byllesby & Company, the Pacific Gas & Electric Company, the Western States Power Company, the Colony Holding Corporation, the Crocker Huffman Company, the Marin Water & Power Company, the Anderson Cottonwood Irrigation District, and, after 1818, as manager of the Moulton Water Company.

"I have lived all over California – Oakland, San Francisco, Redding, Merced, Colfax, Auburn, etc., are a few of the towns and way stations, not to mention Sacramento or various others, as well as construction camps. My residence was for eight years in the town of Colussa, where I endeavored to follow a Yale tradition and do some public-spirited work. I served as president of the high school trustees there and also a term on the grammar school trustees and mixed up in most all of the activities of a small community. Of course, I got small thanks for it.

"My hobbies are few – duck and deer hunting and trout fishing when there is an opportunity and golf and horseback riding some.

"My general charge of the land interests of C.W. Clarke Company keeps me covering a large territory, as these holdings comprise some 80,000 acres of properties in this state, which are scattered widely. Some are three hundred miles south of here and some more than three hundred miles north, and at all stages in between, so I cover a district similar to that from Maine to Virginia. For years I have had to spend the most of my time in an automobile and am not far from finishing my first million miles of driving. I still have hopes of a ship."

The C.W. Clarke Company is a private property corporation, and the North Fork Ditch Company is a private property corporation, and the North Fork Ditch Company is a public utility water company. Jordan belongs to the El Paso Country Club, and he is a Democrat and a Mason. He was married December 24, 1914, at St. Joseph, Mo., to Grace Wilma, daughter of George Henry and Barbara (Bechtel) Hoover. Mrs. Jordan attended Millsaps College in Jackson, Miss. The Jordans have two children, Loring Kenneth, Jr. born December 1, 1915, at Atascadero, Calif., and Nina Vinette, born September 13, 1917, at Redding, Calif.

Taken from: 1909S Quarter Centry Report, Class History, vol. IV.

For additional biographical information, see reunion volumes for the class of 1909 Sheffield.

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William Amos Jordan

1893 Jan 11 -

Jordan has been with the Southern New England Telephone Company since 1915. In August, 1942, he was transferred from New Haven to Middletown, Conn., as manager in charge of the Middletown, East Hampton, and Moodus exchanges, but since March, 1948, has been back in New Haven in his present capacity. During the war he was chairman of the Middletown War Finance Committee (War Bond drives) and a member fo the general committee of the War Council and of the Middletown Transportation Committee. He is a member of the Church of the Redeemer in New Haven, during the period from 1939 to 1942 being clerk of the church, and while living in Middletown he served for three years as a trustee of the First Church of Christ, Congregational. Jordan belongs to Wooster Lodge, No. 79, A.F. and A.M., in New Haven.

"My only travels, outside of New England," he says, "have been an annual trip to Missouri to visit my mother, who was 100 years old on July 24, 1951, and who is still active and mentally alert. My only hobby at the present time is gardening. During the last twenty years I have devoted much time to figure skating and have been a member of the New Haven Skating Club. I did a little stamp collecting, and I still keep up a collection of Yale Football memorabilia that makes it possible for me to check facts about every game Yale has played since we entered college."

On June 15, 1918, he was married in Woodmont, Conn., to Marion Josephine Porter, daughter of George Willis and Mathilde Von Noll Friedrich Porter. Their daughter, Mary Porter, who was born in New Haven, December 5, 1924, received a B.A. Degree at Vassar in 1945 and an M.A. at Wesleyan in 1947. She married Newell Charlton Gilbert, Washington and Lee '41, son of Frank Wellington Gilbert, Yale '16, and has a son, Charlton Hovenden, born on January 2, 1951.

Taken from: History of the Class of Nineteen Fifteen, vol. III, 1952

For additional biographical information, see reunion volumes for the class of 1915.