Jim Jordan (conjure doctor)

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Jim Jordan
Conjure doctor
  • businessman
    • Spouse
    Adell Cooper
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1900; died 1955)​
    Children42

    James Spurgeon Jordan (

    conjure doctor and businessman. Born to former slaves in eastern North Carolina, he learned folk healing practices from his family. His faith healing practice, using methods such as herbal medicine
    and crystal ball reading, became well known along the East Coast. This and his other business endeavors developed a community around him known as "Jordanville".

    Early life

    Jordan was born in 1871 in

    sharecropper and lay preacher after emancipation.[3] His mother, Harriet (née Hill), who was thought to be of Black Indian descent, was a homemaker and weaver and introduced her son to folk medical traditions.[4] In his formative years, his family sharecropped on the farm of inventor Henry Gatling, who acted kindly toward the young Jordan.[5] He attended a one-room school and was immersed in stories of ghosts and witches.[6] A conjurer uncle taught him herbal medicine and cartomancy in the early 1890s.[7]

    Jordan worked as a sharecropper in early adulthood while running a small conjure practice on the side.[8] A conjurer cousin taught him palmistry and more herbal medicine.[9] He sold love potions and goofer dust early on.[10] At the same time, there were difficulties; he drank heavily and once nearly died when a neighbor slashed his neck while fighting on the way to a bar.[11] He married Adell Cooper in 1900; apparently with his wife's approval, he had many other relationships over the years, including with his wife's younger sister Minnie, and fathered a total of 42 children into his eighties.[12]

    Conjuring and business in "Jordanville"

    Tired of farm work, Jordan made his spiritual practice full time in November 1921.

    sandlot baseball team called the Como Eagles.[15] His conjuring business boomed after 1937 as he quit drinking, and he took in about US$100,000 annually for a period of fifteen years; "Jordanville" developed out of hundreds of people in his family or employment.[16] He built a good reputation known up and down the East Coast.[13][17] Cars from as far as New York were often seen parked on the muddy road to his home, and buses brought him patients almost daily.[18]

    Stories of Jordan's miraculous power were numerous.

    Medical doctors acknowledged that he referred patients to them when he could not treat them himself.[26]

    Death and legacy

    Jordan died of

    colon cancer in 1962 at the age of 90.[27] Folklorist F. Roy Johnson published a biography, The Fabled Doctor Jim Jordan: A Story of Conjure (1963), based partly on interviews with Jordan in the last years of his life.[28][29] A multimedia performance by filmmaker Caroline Stephenson, adapted from Johnson's book, was staged in Winton in April 2013.[30] A historic marker to Jordan was installed in Murfreesboro in 2019 by the Murfreesboro Historical Association.[31][32]

    References

    1. ^ "Conjure doctor well remembered in Murfreesboro" (video). WRAL. February 2, 2015. Event occurs at 0:30. Retrieved October 19, 2023.
    2. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 12–14, 19–20.
    3. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 18, 41, 45.
    4. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 14, 36, 42.
    5. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 31–32.
    6. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 26–28.
    7. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 22, 31, 33–34, 41–42.
    8. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 41, 46.
    9. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 48–49.
    10. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 48, 50–52.
    11. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 41, 43.
    12. ^ Johnson 1968, p. 45, 125–126.
    13. ^
      Newspapers.com
      .
    14. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 55–56.
    15. ^ Johnson 1968, p. 59–60, 117–125.
    16. ^ Johnson 1968, p. 60, 68.
    17. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 53, 57, 67–68.
    18. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 57, 65–67.
    19. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 102–109.
    20. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 53, 104.
    21. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 85–94, 128–130.
    22. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 95–101.
    23. ^ Johnson 1968, p. 114.
    24. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 69–71.
    25. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 81–84.
    26. ^ Johnson 1968, p. 76.
    27. ^ Johnson 1968, pp. 132–133.
    28. Newspapers.com
      .
    29. ^ Bryant, Cal (October 28, 2014). "The Great Storyteller". Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald. Retrieved October 19, 2023.
    30. ^ "Documentary Plays". carolinestephenson.com. Archived from the original on March 13, 2023.
    31. ^ Taylor, Holly (September 20, 2019). "Legends & Lore". Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald. Retrieved October 19, 2023.
    32. ^ "Conjure Doctor". William G. Pomeroy Foundation. June 14, 2019. Retrieved October 19, 2023.

    Bibliography

    • Johnson, F. Roy (1968) [copyright 1963]. The Fabled Doctor Jim Jordan: A Story of Conjure.
      OCLC 57317779
      .
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