BIO: Benjamin JORDAN, Dauphin County, PA Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by JAWB Copyright 2006. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/dauphin/ http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/dauphin/runk/runk-bios.htm _______________________________________________________________ Commemorative Biographical Encyclopedia of Dauphin County, Containing Sketches of Representative Citizens, and Many of the Early Scotch-Irish and German Settlers. Chambersburg, Pa.: J. M. Runk & Company, 1896, page 204. _______________________________________________________________ JORDAN, BENJAMIN, son of Thomas Jordan and Rachel Steele, was born July 19, 1779, on the ground where the town of Milton, Northumberland county, Pa., is located. Thomas Jordan, the first of his family, was an emigrant from Scotland, coming to America prior to 1700, and settled in Cecil county, Md. He and his family were rigid Presbyterians, and attached themselves to Christianna church, located just over the line in the State of Delaware. In the yard of that church the remains of four generations of the Jordan family rest. Thomas Jordan, father of Benjamin, was born near this old church prior to 1752, from whence he removed to Northumberland county, prior to the war of the Revolution. When the son was only a few weeks old the family were driven from their home by the marauding Indians, when they located in York county where Thomas Jordan died. He married Rachel Steele, the eldest sister of Gen. Archibald and Gen. John Steele, of Revolutionary memory. In 1805 Benjamin Jordan removed to Lancaster, where he engaged himself in the business of bookseller with William Dickson, at the same time assisted in editing the Lancaster Intelligencer until 1808, when he was appointed weighmaster of the port of Philadelphia. In 1816 he resigned and came to Dauphin county, taking up his residence at Walnut Hill. Mr. Jordan represented the Dauphin District in the State Senate 1846 to 1850. He died at his residence May 24, 1861, in the eighty-second year of his age. Mr. Jordan married, October 29, 1811, Mary Crouch, born October 23, 1791, at Walnut Hill, Dauphin county, Pa.; died October 27, 1846, at the same place; daughter of Edward Crouch and Margaret Potter. They are both interred in old Paxtang church graveyard.