Takoma Profiles – 10 Things You Should Know About Lee Jordan
February is Black History Month and we celebrate Takoma Park’s own Black hero – Lee A. Jordan. The City Council has declared that February 23rd shall be honored every year as Lee Jordan Day. And on this day this year Takoma Radio (94.3-FM) airs an hour-long Special Program featuring segments from interviews with older people talking about growing up in the Black community during segregation and the decades that followed. Tuesday, 2:30-3:30 pm. (also streaming and archived at takomaradio)
In honor of Lee Jordan Day we’re presenting 10 Things You Should Know About Lee Jordan.
(1) Lee Jordan’s legacy is more than an athletic field named for him at Takoma Park Middle School.
Lee Jordan Field sign
His legacy lives on in the lives of the people he touched, from his first days as custodian at Blair High School until his death in 1988. First and foremost, his guiding presence was felt by the generations of boys and girls, Black and white, whom he coached and mentored. Even those who didn’t play on his teams called him “Mr. Lee,” and absorbed lessons about dignity, respect and doing your best. His work bringing young people together to play sports across racial lines impacted both Black and white students as they negotiated the transition from segregated to integrated schools. And as a leader in the Black community, he played an important role in helping to forge a resilient community before and after segregation. Through his work and by example, he enriched our city as a whole.
(2)He was custodian at Blair High School and then Takoma Park Junior High from 1934-1973.
As the custodian at an all-white high school, Lee Jordan found opportunities to interact with and mentor students. When a group of white boys vandalized the school gym in 1937, his reaction was to volunteer to open the gym on Saturday afternoons so they could play basketball. A skilled athlete himself, he soon became their coach, a first step in his life’s work promoting values of positive values through sports. Read More
(3) He worked to give local Black youth access to sports.
After setting up gym time for white students, Jordan went back to the Blair principal and negotiated local Black teens to use the gym on Saturday nights. He soon started a Boys Club with another local coach, opening a new era for Black boys to play baseball, basketball and later football. In 1950 Jordan established another precedent, integrating his Boys Club, a first in Montgomery County, and then he welcomed girls, renaming it the Takoma Park Boys and Girls Club.
(4) Jordan was also a leader in Takoma Park’s Black community and neighborhoods.
Lee Jordan’s family came north from Mississippi in 1918, participants in the Great Migration. He was eight years old, and, as elsewhere, segregation ruled the day in Takoma Park. As he took on adult roles–pioneering sports organizer, deacon of the First Baptist Church, and president of the community’s citizens association in the 1940s and 50s–he found numerous ways to address the disparities of racial discrimination and inequity. He advocated, both publicly and behind the scenes, for example, pressing the city government for streetlights and paved roads, and successfully campaigning for a playground and a recreation center where Black children and families could gather.
(5) Jordan played a key role in the integration of Montgomery County youth sports.
In the summer of 1956, the Takoma Tigers, a team of white junior high baseball players, showed up for their Montgomery County Boys Baseball League season opener with a Black player. Jordan had worked with the parents and a team coach to bring his best Black player, Sonny Jackson, a sixth-grader, onto the team. It broke the County’s racial barrier and created local friendships during the period when governments were implementing the requirements of the Supreme Court’s Brown v Board of Education rulings. In 1957, the Takoma Tigers went 24-0 for the season and captured the County title with Jackson, a future Major Leaguer, as one of their stars. Within a few years these former teammates would dominate the football, basketball and baseball rosters at the newly integrated Blair High School.
(6) Under Jordan’s guidance, Sonny Jackson went on to a professional baseball career.
Jordan shared a special bond with Jackson, whose parents were neighbors in the Oswego-Ritchie-Geneva neighborhood. After his success with the Tigers, Jackson became Blair High School’s first Black athlete, starring in football, basketball and baseball. Upon graduation in 1962, Jackson turned down the chance to be the first Black offered a Maryland sports scholarship in football, and instead signed on as shortstop with the National League’s Houston Colt.45s/Astros. He was the 1966 Runner-up Rookie MVP and earned a Sports Illustrated cover. After five years in Houston and six years with Atlanta, he retired as a player and took up coaching in the Majors. In 2009, Jackson was one of the first inductees into the Blair Alumni Hall of Fame.
(7) Six other Blair Alumni Hall of Fame inductees have connections to Jordan.
Jordan’s influence shows in the Blair Hall of Fame. Jackson’s teammate Bob Windsor (Class of 1961) played for the San Francisco 49ers and the New England Patriots. Tom Brown (Class of 1958) pitched one year as a Washington Senator before joining the Green Bay Packers for five seasons. Steve Barber (Class of 1956) had a 20-game winning season in his eight years as a Baltimore Oriole. Earlier, Jordan’s pitching advice helped Jack Klippstein (Class of 1945) play 18 seasons in the Majors. Two well-known coaches also cited Jordan as a role model — legendary DeMatha basketball coach Morgan Wooten (Class of 1950) and Alan Dodd (Class of 1947), the Takoma Tigers coach, who became the first director of Integrated education for Montgomery County Public Schools, a role Jordan would have applauded.
(8) Jordan was the rare individual who moved easily back and forth across the color line.
From his earliest days as a custodian, Jordan disregarded the color line, and, in turn, parents welcomed his help, while local business owners, merchants and other admirers gave generously to his Boys and Girls Club. White city officials served on the club’s board of directors. School administrators and police officers called upon him for his mentoring whenever a teen needed a guiding hand. City officials asked him to take a leading role in the launch of the Takoma Park Recreation Council in 1965. Later he became the first Black person appointed to the Montgomery County Recreation Council. In 2006, in recognition of his vital contributions, he was inducted posthumously into the County’s Human Rights Hall of Fame.
(9) Two quintessential stories give insight into the man who was Lee Jordan.
A young police officer stopped Jordan one afternoon for speeding and encountered the usual 23 kids stuffed into his station wagon. Jordan told the officer to give him the ticket but “please hurry, we have a game to make.” No ticket was issued. It turned out that the officer had played for Jordan years earlier. Another time Mr. Lee took his baseball team, including a girl player, to a game in northern Montgomery County. Because of the girl, the opposing coach refused to play. Rather than accept a forfeit, Jordan appealed to County officials, who ruled she could play, and she hit a home run in the rescheduled game.
(10) Jordan’s legacy is in the lives he touched and the inspiration he passed on.
Lee Jordan and his Family
Jordan and his wife Helen were on hand, in June 1981, as hundreds gathered at the newly renovated Takoma Park Junior High field to dedicate it in his honor. In 1983 Mayor Steve Del Giudice celebrated Black History Month in Takoma Park by declaring February 23rd as Lee Jordan Day. Five years later, to the day, Lee Jordan died at age 87 of complications from diabetes. He left behind not only an extended family, but many others who remember how much Mr. Lee cared for them and who remain grateful for the lessons they learned from him. As a community Takoma Park should likewise remember that we were all changed because he called this place his home.
Learn More
Here are some places to learn more about Lee Jordan.
“Lee Jordan: Life and Legacy” – Watch this program from 2020 sponsored by the City of Takoma Park and Historic Takoma.
