Jordan lived a life telling — and creating — stories

By Alonzo Weston

Folk wisdom has it that death comes in threes. If that’s true then the St. Joseph News-Press got hit hard recently.

Last week I wrote about how we lost former managing editor Bob Waldrop and former city editor Bill Scott. Now we’ve lost Terry Jordan, a well-known reporter and editor at the paper. In his early news career, Terry covered concerts and sporting events as well as hard news. My desk sat right across from his before he retired a few years ago. I enjoyed hearing his wild stories and escapades.

But Terry was more than an editor and reporter, he was also a good friend. We’d talk music, movies and baseball at work and when I’d visit him at his house before he was hospitalized. He had extensive knowledge about classic rock, extolling its virtues to the chagrin of younger reporters who preferred newer music. The newsroom used to enjoy our arguments about the Kinks, which was one of Terry’s favorite bands. Mine was always Steely Dan and we’d argue about which band was better endlessly.

Terry also covered concerts and wrote music reviews for the paper. Some readers disagreed with his reviews and others loved them, signs of a good columnist and music critic.

Terry also covered the Kansas City Kings NBA team for a while. I enjoyed hearing his tall tales about the likes of Sidney Wicks and Sam Lacey. He also loved baseball in the 1970s. I’m currently reading a book about ‘70s baseball called “Big Hair And Plastic Grass.” It’s a delightful book about an exciting era in Major League Baseball. Much of the book covers the stuff Terry talked about like Vida Blue pitching a no-hitter on acid and the fiery demeanor of Bob Gibson.

Terry was also a devout bachelor. He was a traveler who had a woman in every port it seemed. His wild stories were highly entertaining to the dismay of his father, who jokingly asked Terry, “Son, why can’t you run around with a better class of women?”

Terry would always bring me back a T-shirt or something from his trips. He knew I liked Steely Dan so he bought me a Steely Dan T-shirt and one from Rudy’s Bar and Grill in New York that’s mentioned in the Steely Dan song “Black Cow.”

The last time I talked to Terry he was in hospice care. He asked me to bring him some old-fashioned Christmas candy. He passed before I could deliver it.

Terry cared about people. After retirement, he would travel to area nursing homes and sing and play piano for the residents. He had an extensive catalog of music from the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. The residents were always overjoyed at his visits.

I could probably write a book filled with Terry Jordan stories. He was that colorful and exciting a person. He will be greatly missed by anyone who had the fortune to meet him. I’ll miss him greatly.