Ann Dibble Jordan

Corporate executive and social work professor Ann Dibble Jordan was born to a prominent family in Tuskegee, Alabama in 1934. In 1955, Jordan graduated from Vassar College with her B.A. degree, and in 1961, she earned her M.A. degree from the School of Social Service Administration at the University of Chicago. From 1970 to 1987, Jordan worked as an Associate Professor at the School of Social Service Administration, and from 1970 to 1985, she served as the Director of Social Services of Chicago Lying-in Hospital, a maternity and women's hospital at the University of Chicago Medical Center. From 1986 to 1987, Jordan served as the Director of the Department of Social Services for the University of Chicago Medical Center. In 1986, she married Vernon Jordan, who made history when he helped organize the integration of the University of Georgia in 1961.

From 1981 to 2007, Jordan served as a director of Johnson & Johnson, and from 1989 to 2007, she served on the board of directors of Citigroup as the Field Work Director. In 1990, Jordan became a director of National Health Laboratories, now called LabCorp, and one year later she became a member of the Board of Trustees of the Brookings Institution, a non-profit public policy organization in Washington, D.C. From 1993 to 2007, Jordan served on the board of directors of Automatic Data Processing (ADP), a global provider of integrated computing and business outsourcing.

In 1994, Jordan and her husband organized a Democratic fundraiser that raised $3 million for the Clinton Campaign; one year later, they were recognized as a power couple by Forbes Magazine. In 1996, Jordan co-chaired President Clinton’s Inauguration, becoming the first African American to chair a Presidential Inaugural. The recipient of a 2004 American Woman Award from the Women’s Research & Education Institute, Jordan became a Director of Revlon in March 2009. Currently Jordan and her husband, Vernon, reside in Washington, D.C. and have four adult children.

Ann Dibble Jordan was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on June 26, 2010.