Bobby Jordan

For other people named Bobby Jordan, see Robert Jordan (disambiguation).

Bobby Jordan
Jordan in They Made Me a Criminal (1939)
Born	Robert G. Jordan (1923-04-01)April 1, 1923 Harrison, New York, U.S.
Died	September 10, 1965(1965-09-10) (aged 42) Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1929–1961
Spouse	Lee Jordan ​ ​ (m. 1946; div. 1957)​

Robert G. Jordan (April 1, 1923 – September 10, 1965) was an American actor, most notable for being a member of the Dead End Kids, the East Side Kids, and The Bowery Boys.

Early life and career

Jordan was born in Harrison, New York. At the age of four, he worked in an early movie version of A Christmas Carol. His mother took him to talent shows in and around Harrison, New York. He also modeled for newspaper and magazine advertisements and appeared in short films and radio programs. In the late 1920s, his family moved to the Upper West Side of Manhattan. In 1929, he was cast as Charles Hildebrand in the 1929 Broadway play Street Scene.

Dead End Kids and East Side Kids

Though he was the youngest, Jordan was the first of the boys who made up the Dead End Kids to work in films with a role in a 1933 Universal short. In 1935, he became one of the original Dead End Kids by winning the role of Angel in Sydney Kingsley's Broadway drama Dead End about life in the slums of the east side of New York City. The play was performed at the Belasco Theatre and ran for three years with over 600 performances. He appeared for the first season and the beginning of the second but left in mid-November 1936. He returned in time to join the others in 1937 in Hollywood, California to make the movie version of the play, starring Humphrey Bogart, Joel McCrea, Sylvia Sidney, and Claire Trevor.

Following the making of Dead End, Jordan found himself "released" from his contract at Goldwyn, and subsequently, he appeared at Warner Brothers with the rest of the Dead End Kids. After one year, Warners released most of them, but kept Leo Gorcey and Jordan as solo performers. Jordan appeared (as Douglas Fairbanks Rosenbloom) in Warner's Damon Runyon comedy A Slight Case of Murder (1938) and at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in Young Tom Edison (1940).

In 1940, Jordan appeared in the movie Military Academy and accepted an offer from producer Sam Katzman to star in a new tough-kid series titled "The East Side Kids." Leo Gorcey soon joined him, then Huntz Hall, and the trio continued to lead the series until 1943 when Jordan entered the United States Army during World War II as a foot soldier in the 97th Infantry Division. He subsequently was involved in an elevator accident that forced him to have surgery to remove his right kneecap.

Later career and personal life

When Jordan returned to films in 1945, he found that his former castmates Gorcey and Hall were obtaining the lion's share of both the content and the salary for the new Bowery Boys film series. Dissatisfied with his background status, he left the series after eight entries, and made only a few films thereafter.

On July 1, 1957, Jordan played Bob Ford, the assailant of Jesse James, in the television series Tales of Wells Fargo. One of his later performances was in an episode of Bonanza titled "The Many Faces of Gideon Flinch", where he played one of Bullet Head Burke's men.

In subsequent years, Jordan worked as a bartender, a bad choice for him considering his alcoholism. He worked to support his family as a door-to-door photograph salesman and as a roughneck for an oil driller.

In 1957, Jordan and his wife divorced, they had one son, Robert Jr.

Death

On August 25, 1965, Jordan entered the Veterans Hospital in Sawtelle, California, for treatment of cirrhosis of the liver. He died on September 10, 1965 at the age of 42. His former Dead End Kid and East Side Kid co-star Leo Gorcey once observed, "Bobby Jordan must not have had a guardian angel."

Filmography

Film (partial)

• Kid Millions (1934) as Tourist (uncredited)
• Dead End (1937) as Angel
• A Slight Case of Murder (1938) as Douglas Fairbanks Rosenbloom
• Crime School (1938) as Lester "Squirt" Smith
• Reformatory (1938) as Pinky Leonard
• My Bill (1938) as Reginald Colbrook Jr.
• Angels with Dirty Faces (1938) as Swing
• They Made Me a Criminal (1939) as Angel
• Off the Record (1939) as Mickey Fallon
• Hell's Kitchen (1939) as Joey Richards
• The Angels Wash Their Faces (1939) as Bernie Smith
• Dust Be My Destiny (1939) as Jimmy Glenn
• On Dress Parade (1939) as Cadet Ronny Morgan
• Young Tom Edison (1940) as Joe "Joey" Doyle
• You're Not So Tough (1940) as Rap
• Boys of the City (1940) as Danny Dolan
• Military Academy (1940) as Dick Hill
• That Gang of Mine (1940) as Danny Dolan
• Give Us Wings (1940) as Rap
• Pride of the Bowery (1940) as Danny
• Flying Wild (1941) as Danny Dolan
• Bowery Blitzkrieg (1941) as Danny Breslin
• Spooks Run Wild (1941) as Danny
• Mr. Wise Guy (1942) as Danny Collins
• Let's Get Tough! (1942) as Danny Connors
• Smart Alecks (1942) as Danny Stevens
• Neath Brooklyn Bridge (1942) as Danny Lyons
• Junior Army (1942) as Jockey
• Kid Dynamite (1943) as Danny Lyons
• Keep 'Em Slugging (1943) as Tommy Banning
• Clancy Street Boys (1943) as Danny
• Ghosts on the Loose (1943) as Danny
• Destroyer (1943) as Sobbing Sailor (uncredited)
• Adventures of the Flying Cadets (1943, Serial) as Cadet "Jinx" Roberts
• Bowery Champs (1944) as Bobby Jordan
• Live Wires (1946) as Bobby
• In Fast Company (1946) as Bobby
• Bowery Bombshell (1946) as Bobby
• Spook Busters (1946) as Bobby
• Mr. Hex (1946) as Bobby
• The Beginning or the End (1947) as Radioman on Tinian Receiving A-Bomb Message (uncredited)
• Hard Boiled Mahoney (1947) as Bobby
• News Hounds (1947) as Bobby
• Bowery Buckaroos (1947) as Bobby
• Treasure of Monte Cristo (1949) as Tony Torecelli
• The Fat Man (1951) as Ted - Bellhop (uncredited)
• The Eddie Cantor Story (1953) as Customer (uncredited)
• The Man Is Armed (1956) as Thorne

Television

Year	Series	Role	Notes
1951	Boston Blackie	Waiter	Episode: "The Devil's Daughters"
1951/1952/1958	Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok	Conductor / Steve Manson / Sandy Smith	3 Episodes
1952	The Unexpected	Unknown	Episode: "Calculated Risk"
1952	Gruen Guild Theater	Unknown	Episode: "For Life"
1952	Fireside Theatre	Unknown	Episode: "A Grand for Grandma"
1955	I Led 3 Lives	Comrade Kapotek	Episode: "Brainwash"
1956	Ford Star Jubilee	Third Sailor	Episode: "High Tor"
1956	Dragnet	Unknown	Episode: "The Big Search"
1957	The Millionaire	Press Agent	Episode: "The Professor Amberson Adams Story"
1957	State Trooper	Ed Howard	Episode: "The Live Shell Game"
1957	Tales of Wells Fargo	Ernest 'Ernie' Handsfelt / Sonny Stillwell / Bob Ford	3 Episodes
1957	Casey Jones	Billy Mapes	Episode: "Storm Warning"
1957/1958	Highway Patrol	Ed / Market Manager	2 Episodes
1958	Richard Diamond, Private Detective	Connie Thorpe	Episode: "The Payoff"
1958	The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin	Bart Desay	Episode: "Top Gun"
1958/1959	Maverick	Bank Teller / Willy / Kansas City Hotel Desk Clerk	3 episodes
1959	77 Sunset Strip	Auto Mechanic	Episode: "Not an Enemy in the World"
1959	M Squad	Car Lot Employee	Episode: "Death by Adoption"
1960	The DuPont Show with June Allyson	Willie	Episode: "Once Upon a Knight"
1960	Rawhide	Adair	S2:E28, "Incident of the Murder Steer"
1960	Peter Gunn	Waiter	Episode: "Tramp Steamer"
1961	Michael Shayne	Mel Steele	Episode: "The Body Beautiful"
1961	Route 66	Garage Attendant	Episode: "A Skill for Hunting"
1961	The Roaring 20's	Herbie	Episode: "Royal Tour"
1961	Bonanza	Thug #2	Episode: "The Many Faces of Gideon Flinch"

Further reading

• Dye, David. Child and Youth Actors: Filmography of Their Entire Careers, 1914-1985. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 1988, p. 120.
• Holmstrom, John. The Moving Picture Boy: An International Encyclopaedia from 1895 to 1995, Norwich, Michael Russell, 1996, p. 116.

External links

• Bobby Jordan at IMDb
• Bobby Jordan at the Internet Broadway Database
• Bobby Jordan at Find a Grave