DR. EUGENE JAMES JORDAN, 83

December 7, 1936 — August 28, 2020

OBITUARY

DENTIST WAS REVERED FOR HIS COMMUNAL, ACTIVIST SPIRIT

By R. T. Andrews

Eugene Jordan practiced dentistry in the heart of Cleveland's black community for fifty years, simultaneously looking after the dental needs of his patients, serving his profession as teacher, ambassador, worker, and leader through a myriad of organizations local and global, and supporting and guiding a plethora of community, civic, and political causes with consistent passion and empathy. With equal dedication and energy, he and his first wife, Delores [née Mixon] supported their three children in their pursuit of advanced degrees in health care. 

Jordan died August 28. He was 83.

Some of Jordan's patients were unable to afford even the modest fees charged for his services. Like a big-hearted country dentist, he was known to accept payment by barter, his working class patients occasionally performing odd jobs around his University Heights home or helping to prepare food for family picnics. They were likely unaware of his prominence both within the profession and in the community, where he put in the work without fanfare.

Early in his career, Jordan was a member of all the standard local, state, and national dental professional organizations. But even as he taught at Case Western Reserve University's College of Dentistry, and later serve on a congressional committee on health reform, it was in the black community that he found his niche. He joined the Forest City Dental Society, co-founded the Buckeye State Dental Association, and eventually became president of the National Dental Association, the leading professional organization for dentists of color worldwide. Family vacations were planned around the NDA's annual convention.

A prolific reader with a curious mind, Jordan's household had books scattered everywhere. He had few rules as a parent, but insisted that his children study math, science, and master a sport. He reasoned that those disciplines would produce adults who would be strong of mind and body, and thus able to fend for themselves. The formula worked. Martin and his sister Joy became dentists and joined their father as partners in the Jordan Center practice he established; younger brother Michael became a psychiatrist.

Jordan had followed that same formula himself. Although he never played varsity basketball for his hometown Buckeyes, Jordan did make the freshman squad before leaving Ohio State to enroll in the US Army Medical/Dental Corps. When he returned home, he enrolled at Capital University, graduating in 1965 with a biology degree. With three children in tow, the family packed up and moved to Washington DC, where Jordan entered Howard School of Dentistry. After graduation, he secured a one year post-graduate internship at the Veterans Hospital in Philadelphia before the family returned to Ohio, settling in Cleveland.

The decision to live and work in Cleveland was influenced by Jordan's desire to be in a large city with multiple professional sports teams, one that was reasonably close to his hometown of Columbus, where his parents were still living. Cleveland fit the bill and Jordan became an ardent Browns and Cavaliers fan.

Jordan quickly plunged into his chosen profession, working as a staff dentist at the Hough Norwood Health Center [forerunner to Northeast Ohio Neighborhood Health Services]. volunteering at the Cleveland Free Clinic, and serving as a clinical instructor at Case Western Reserve University's College of Dental Medicine.

Jordan soon opened his first office above the Rexall Drug Store at Euclid Ave. and N. Taylor Rd. in East Cleveland. He later moved his practice west on Euclid to a former mansion just east of University Circle. Eventually he opened a second office in Cleveland's Lee-Harvard area to accommodate his growing practice.

In addition to his dental work, his family, and his professional service, Jordan was extraordinarily active with a host of community organizations, and was a dependable member and leader in most of them. He was a throwback to the sort of activist who in earlier times would have been described as a "race man". He gave unstintingly to all manner of community groups and causes. Among his favorites were the NAACP, the Association of African American Cultural Gardens, and the loose fraternity of civic spirits known as the Carnegie Roundtable. Invariably siding with the masses, Jordan once sat in for several days and nights at the Cleveland Board of Education in protest of policies that he believed were not in the best interests of the city's tens of thousands of school children.

Dr. Jordan is survived by his second wife, Bernice; three children, Dr. Joy Jordan, Dr. Martin Jordan, both of Cleveland, and Dr. Michael Jordan of Phoenix, AZ; and three grandchildren, Mica, Mariah, and Michael, all of Cleveland.

Final arrangements were handled by the Pernel Jones Funeral Home.

Jordan often recited a maxim that seems an apt summary of his life and work. As recalled by his son, Martin, it goes something like this: "Happy are those who dream dreams and are ready to pay the price to make those dreams come true."

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