By Minister Dale Edwards, executive director of the Call and Post Newspaper at Callandpost.com and Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief at and Kathy Wray Coleman at Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com (Also read this article in the Call and Post Newspaper)
CLEVELAND, Ohio- Beloved civil and human rights activist Dr. Eugene Jordan (pictured), a Cleveland and East Cleveland dentist, has died.
He was 83.
Arrangements are entrusted to Pernel Jones & Sons Funeral Home in Cleveland with public viewing on Friday, Sept 4 from 3-7 pm and funeral services Sat., Sept 5 at 9 am, both at the funeral home on the city's largely Black east side.
The interment will be at Lakeview Cemetery in Cleveland.
During an interview, four-term Cleveland Mayor Jackson, a former city council president and the city's third Black mayor, said Dr. Jordan was a talented dentist and a genuine Civil Rights activist with an unselfish agenda and a deep love of the Black community.
"I remember when councilman Lonnie Burton was alive and he referred me to Dr. Jordan as a dentist, and in interacting with him there is no doubt that he has always been a person where Black people have always been in the forefront of his mind," said Mayor Jackson. "Whenever there was something of issue relative to Black people he always stood up, and he never was disrespectful or self-serving."
Jackson said that Jordan was "a true advocate for the agenda of Black people and will be sorely missed."
Speakers for Saturday's funeral include Cleveland NAACP President Danielle Sydnor, activists Khalid Samad and Art McKoy, Cleveland Councilman Kevin Conwell, East Cleveland Councilman Nathaniel Martin, Carnegie Roundtable President Charles E. Bibb Sr., and members of the medical community.
Interim Antioch Baptist Church senior pastor the Rev. Dr Marvin McMickle, a former Cleveland NAACP president, will deliver the eulogy.
Dr Jordan is survived by his second wife, Bernice Jordan, three grown children, Dr. Joy Jordan of East Cleveland and Dr. Martin Jordan of Cleveland, both of them dentists like their father, Dr Michael Jordan of Phoenix, Arizona, a psychiatrist, and three grandchildren, Mica, Mariah, and Michael Eugene Jordan.
One of four siblings raised in Columbus, Ohio by a single father, a widower who was a maintenance worker for the City of Columbus, Dr Eugene Jordan attended the Ohio State University and graduated from Capital University in Columbus with an undergraduate degree in biology.
After a stint with the Army Medical Corps, he worked his way through Howard University Dental School and later set up dental practices in Cleveland and East Cleveland, where he practiced dentistry and fought for civil and human rights for Black people.
He was a loyal and life long member of the NAACP where he served 20 years on the executive board of its local chapter in Cleveland, and he served as the 69th president of the National Dental Association.
Dr. Joy Jordan, the eldest of his three children and a former East Cleveland Board of Education president, announced the death of her father in a Facebook post on Saturday.
"Friday my Dad joined his ancestors," Joy Jordan said. "Rest Daddy."
Hundreds responded on social media to his passing.
A representative from the National Dental Association that Joy Jordan previously led like her father, and as its 80th president, said in a statement that "we send our sincere condolences to Dr. Joy Jordan on the passing of her father, Dr. Eugene Jordan, D.D.S."
A pillar in the East Cleveland and greater Cleveland communities, Eugene Jordan was a fighter and was in the trenches on issues ranging from racism, education, and voting rights, to excessive force and Black liberation and enfranchisement.
He had been vice president of the African-American Cultural Gardens in Cleveland and led the activist group the Underground Railroad in recent years.
The Civil Rights activist frequently picketed with activists when called upon, and on his own volition, whether it was a sit-in at Cleveland State University in the 1990s in support of Black scholar and author Dr Raymond Winbush, who left the university as its vice president on minority affairs over a salary dispute and alleged racism, or racial unrest regarding Cleveland police killings on Blacks, including Michael Pipkins in 1992.
He practiced general dentistry and remained active in the community and in community activism until illness slowed him, and as late as this summer.
"Our beloved Dr. Eugene Jordan, a mighty warrior in the struggle for civil and human rights, has made his transition," said activist Ruth Standiford on behalf of the Cleveland activist group Peace in the Hood, which is led by activist Khalid Samad, who will moderate the funeral services this weekend. "Rest in Peace Dr Jordan."
The elder Jordan's office secretary and personal assistant of 20 years, Linda Fuller, said Eugene Jordan was a supreme dentist and activist, and a family man who was both kind and caring.
"Dr Jordan's work speaks for itself," Fuller said. "He had a fond love for his patients, his friends, his family, and the community, and we will miss him dearly."
Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, the most read Black digital newspaper in Ohio. Tel: (216) 659-0473. Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. We interviewed former president Barack Obama one-on-one when he was campaigning for president. As to the Obama interview. CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, OHIO'S LEADER IN BLACK DIGITAL NEWS.
