William H. Jordan Sr., a man who watched Cape Elizabeth evolve from a remote farming community famous for its cabbage to the most affluent community in the state, died Sunday at the age of 82.

For more than 45 years Bill Jordan had his hand in the inner workings of the town, dedicating a large portion of his life to the community he grew up in.

“Everybody has to have a hobby,” explained William H. “Bib” Jordan Jr., Bill’s son.

Services for Bill Jordan Visiting hours will be held Thursday, Oct. 6, from 2 to 4 and 6 to 8 p.m. at Hobbs Funeral Home, 230 Cottage Road, South Portland. The funeral service will be Friday, Oct. 7, at 2 p.m. at St. Bartholomew’s Church, 8 Two Lights Road, Cape Elizabeth.

Bill’s daughter Carol Anne Jordan said he was never “boastful” of the things he accomplished during his life. And the list is extensive.

Bill farmed from a young age, working on Spurwink Farm in Cape Elizabeth with his sister Norma – now Norma Wainwright – and their older brother Pete before the war. During World War II Bill joined the Army and served in an armored division in North Africa and Europe.

When he returned from the war in 1945 he married his sweetheart, Ruth Young, bought the family homestead on Wells Road in Cape Elizabeth from his great-aunts, and began raising a family and farming the land. He was 23 years old.

Bill was first elected to the Cape Elizabeth Board of Selectmen in 1961 and continued to serve when the town in 1967 adopted a council-manager charter and replaced the select board with the Town Council. He remained in office until 1979. He returned to the Town Council in 1986, serving until 1998, when he retired from public service.

He was chairman of the council numerous times and was involved with many of major events in the town’s history, such as the purchase of Fort Williams from the federal government, the creation of Crescent Beach State Park, the acquisition of Gull Crest Farm and the development of the town’s greenbelt.

He wasn’t just involved in municipal government, either. He was a member of the building committee for Cape Elizabeth High School and for the additions and renovations of Pond Cove School and the middle school. He was also an active member of the agricultural community, not only in Cape but the entire state.

All the while he ran the farm with his children, who have now taken over its day-to-day operations, and have coordinated the preservation of 45 acres of strawberry fields overlooking the Spurwink Marsh, as well as a continuing effort to keep the family’s land a working farm.

Bill was a member of the Cape Elizabeth Fire Department Hose Company 2 for over 50 years, serving as captain from 1959 to 1966. In 1966 he became deputy fire chief of the volunteer fire department, being promoted to chief in 1980, and serving in that capacity until 1986.

Strong traits

His sister Norma thinks her brother took after their Grandfather Jordan, who was also member of Cape’s Board of Selectmen. Wainwright said Bill’s wife Ruth used to say if she needed to find Bill she would either go to the council or to the fire department. “He was very dedicated,” Wainwright said.

So dedicated, in fact, Wainwright wasn’t surprised when Bill rescheduled heart surgery so he wouldn’t miss a Town Council meeting. “He was a good guy, and a good family man,” she said.

Jordan “was just a great, great person,” Cape Elizabeth Town Manager Michael McGovern said. “He was totally dedicated to the community.”

In the entire history of Cape Elizabeth, stretching back to 1765, only one elected official has had two places in town named after him – and that person is Bill Jordan. When Bill left the Town Council the first time in 1979, Jordan Way, where the police department is located, was named after Bill and his distant cousin Dick Jordan, who left the council the same year.

After Bill retired from public service in 1998 the William H. Jordan Conference Room located in Town Hall was also dedicated to him.

Bill also has the honor of being the only individual to receive the Ralph T. Gould Award for outstanding service to the Cape community while still being a member of the Town Council, McGovern said.

School Board member Henry Adams served on the Town Council with Bill for six years, from 1973 to 1979. He said Jordan was very thoughtful, deliberate and fair in the decisions he made while on the council. But, above all, Adams said “he had the interests of the town foremost in his mind in whatever he did.”

Cape Elizabeth resident Robert Smith served two terms on the Town Council with Jordan in the 1970s. Smith said Bill “was an outstanding member of the council” and “a key guy in helping Cape Elizabeth along from a municipal standpoint.”

“We all respected him,” Smith said, “He will be greatly missed.”

Devoted to family

In July, after 60 years of marriage, Bill’s wife Ruth passed away. Though his health didn’t deteriorate after that, “it was just a little harder for him to keep busy,” Carol, his daughter, said.

“He was very much in love with his wife,” said Wendi Whitcomb, a health care provider who worked with Ruth during the last part of her life. When Ruth went to a nearby nursing home, Whitcomb followed. She would watch Bill arrive at the nursing home every day at 11:10 a.m. to eat lunch with his wife. “You could set your watch by that man,” she said. “He was a man who was totally punctual. … He had the old-fashioned type of ideals.”

Whitcomb remembered, “he loved to hear his wife sing.” Ruth would sing the old favorites for him, like “You Are My Sunshine,” and “She’ll Be Coming ‘Round the Mountain When She Comes.”

“This is a family that doesn’t abandon their own,” Whitcomb said. Ruth had someone with her at every meal, as did Bill for the three weeks he was in the hospital. “They’d still be doing it if it was necessary,’ she said.

After Ruth died in July, Whitcomb stayed on working as a farm hand. Bill and his wife were known for treating their farm hands very well. “They treated them like family,” Whitcomb said.

Another farm hand, Tray Winchenbaugh, has been working at the Jordan farm for three years, but said she remembers hearing about how charitable Bill and Ruth Jordan were long before she ever started working on the farm.

She said Bill and Ruth would deliver baskets of fresh vegetables to families in the town who couldn’t afford them.

“He was known and renowned beyond the confines of Cape Elizabeth,” Winchenbaugh said.

William H. “Bill” Jordan Sr., second from left, and his wife Ruth, center, celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary at a joint party with Bill’s brother Pete’s 80th birthday, left, and his sister Emma Kennedy’s 60th anniversary with her husband Art, in this family photo from 1995.

Copy the Story Link