Some people look forward to entering their seventh decade
by taking it easy, maybe doing a little fishing, starting up a
hobby. But DR Jordan, chairman of the Jordan Pile Driving
company of Mobile, Ala., is still going into work five days a week.
“I’m still full time, to be honest. I go every day, though they are
encouraging me to take Fridays off,” said Jordan. “I ask too many
questions when I’m here.”
Jordan, at 70, is two years older than the company that bears
his family’s name. Though it identifies as a Mobile-based business
today, Jordan’s father began it in Ozark, Ala. back in the 1940s.
HC “Hack” Jordan already had experience working in the bridgebuilding
department of the AT&N Railroad. He had also worked,
amongst other projects, on the piling crew for Mobile’s Admiral
Semmes Hotel, now part of the Radisson chain. Hack didn’t fight
overseas during the Second World War due to poor eyesight; as
an alternative, he went to work in a shipyard in the port city of
Brunswick, Ga.
“That’s where I was born,” said Jordan.
Jordan was an only child, so on Saturdays in Ozark he would
hang out with his dad.
“Back then, we worked all day on Saturday and had company
meetings on Sunday … Dad was a very small operator,” said Jordan.
“He would let me go with him on Saturdays. I would wash trucks;
that’s how I got involved.”
Initially, the Ozark move may have seemed temporary – it’s
where Hack got his first contract. According to the Jordan website,
“When the war ended, he returned to his hometown of Toxey, Ala.,
cashed in his life savings of $304.72 and started building his first
wooden (skid-rig) piledriver.”
The family ended up staying in Ozark for a while.
INDUSTRY PIONEER:
DR JORDAN
From going to work on Saturdays
with his dad to still working
full-time at 70, DR Jordan
has pile driving in his blood
By Jim Chliboyko
PDCA INDUSTRY PIONEER
Mobile, Ala., home of the
Jordan Pile Driving company
Photo courtesy of DR Jordan
Background: Steven Frame/Shutterstock
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