Harold Jordan, MD, who in 1964 became the first African American resident physician at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, died Dec. 26. He was 87 and lived in California, where he had moved after retirement to be near family.
In a distinguished career that bridged academia and public service, Dr. Jordan served as chair of Psychiatry at Meharry Medical College, his medical alma mater, and also served as acting dean of the School of Medicine at Meharry. He also served as Assistant Commissioner for Psychiatric Services and, following that, Commissioner of Mental Health and Mental Retardation for the state of Tennessee.
“Dr. Jordan was a beacon of hope and light who blazed trails at Vanderbilt University Medical Center as he became its first African American resident in 1964,” said Melissa Hall, MD, FAPA, associate professor of Clinical Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, who serves as the department’s director of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Social Justice. “[He] is a giant in the history of our department who served as a champion of diversity and inclusion.”
Dr. Jordan’s family roots in medicine were deep; both his great-grandfather and grandfather were physicians who trained at Meharry. When he was growing up in Newnan, Georgia, just south of Atlanta, he heard family tales of his medical forebears and was inspired to follow their footsteps.
“I had wanted to do that since I heard about them,” he said in an interview in 2017.
In that same interview, Dr. Jordan recalled interviewing with William F. Orr Jr., MD, who was chair of Psychiatry at Vanderbilt from 1947 to 1969.
The interview went well, and Orr offered Dr. Jordan one of the three residency slots in Psychiatry that year. “Dr. Orr was very encouraging, accepting and protective,” Dr. Jordan said. “He made it clear that I would be accepted. I felt secure. I knew the path was clear for me.”
That support was important, because in that era, Vanderbilt had very few African American trainees in any of its schools.
Vanderbilt’s first African American student, Joseph Johnson Jr., was admitted to the Divinity School in 1953, and in 1956 two Black law students had been admitted as well. It would be two years after Dr. Jordan began his residency, 1966, before the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine would admit its first African American student, Levi Watkins Jr.
Dr. Jordan recalled that the faculty and his fellow residents were encouraging and supportive. “My colleagues were fine — there were no problems in Psychiatry” — but the unusual sight for that time of an African American physician at Vanderbilt sometimes made for awkward misunderstandings.
“I walked into the emergency room [for a consult] and somebody thought I was the janitor and said, ‘The trash is over there,’” he remembered.
“I would laugh at them, like, ‘What are you talking about?’” he said.
“Harold Jordan, like every minority student, resident or faculty member who breaks the color barrier at a predominantly white institution, is very much like the first astronaut stepping on the moon or any new planet,” said André Churchwell, MD, Levi Watkins Jr. MD Professor of Medicine and professor of Biomedical Engineering and Radiology and Radiologic Sciences, and Senior Advisor to the Chancellor in Inclusion and Community Outreach at Vanderbilt University. “Dr Jordan created a trail for all of us of minority and underrepresented status to follow, and to learn from the guideposts he left. He is truly a Vanderbilt and civil rights legend.”
“Dr. Jordan was a trailblazer at VUMC, in Tennessee and across the nation,” said Consuelo H. Wilkins, MD, MSCI, professor of Medicine and Senior Vice President and Senior Associate Dean, Health Equity and Inclusive Excellence. “He helped changed the culture with his leadership, passion for educating and mentoring, and commitment to excellence. His legacy and contributions to inclusive excellence and eliminating health inequities are deeply embedded in VUMC.”
Dr. Jordan maintained a clinical appointment on the faculty of the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine until 2016.
He said his time at Vanderbilt was important to him, both personally and professionally.
“It was a very positive influence,” he said. “I just felt very supported at both Meharry and Vanderbilt. I felt blessed to have had that experience in Psychiatry.”
In 2019 the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences established a named lecture, the Dr. Harold Jordan Diversity and Inclusion Lecture. The department also annually gives the Dr. Harold Jordan award, which is awarded to a physician trainee who contributes to the department’s diversity and inclusion mission.
“The Vanderbilt University Medical Center Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences extends its deepest condolences to the entire family of Dr. Jordan,” Hall said. “May the legacy of Dr. Harold Jordan continue to live on.”
Dr. Jordan is survived by his wife, Geraldine, to whom he was married for 62 years, and two sons, two daughters, three grandchildren and one great-grandchild.
