Lucille A. Jordan, a fixture in the business and year-round community for over forty years, died July 24, 2023 on Nantucket with her son Ehren Jordan at hand, from side effects of 2006 tonsil cancer treatments. She was 75.
Lucille was born and grew up in Pittsburgh, PA daughter of Edward and Genevieve Ehrenberger and the fourth of six children, a middle child. She held a Bachelor’s Degree in Early Childhood Development and Psychology from the University of Pittsburgh and studied Montessori Education at the graduate level at Xavier University. She moved to Nantucket in 1976 and immediately became a major force in the community, living a brightly blazing life and leaving behind long-lasting accomplishments. In 1978 Lucille founded the Montessori Children’s House of Nantucket. “I have an on-going Interest in education. It has been a lifelong adult interest,” the I&M later quoted her.
She secured a permanent campus for the school four years after its founding and soon after that, teacher housing. More than four decades ago, she had the foresight to understand the benefit that secure housing plays in the island’s workforce. She remained an active school Trustee for many years, making and maintaining generations of lasting friendships with parents and students.
Education was always at the top of her priority list. She served on the Board of Trustees at the Nantucket Atheneum from 2004-2010 and was a lifelong listener and long-term corporate sponsor of National Public Radio.
Lucille was the first woman to join the Rotary Club of Nantucket as an active member. “It was a men’s organization, and now it has become a business organization that includes and recognizes all working people. I think it is great now that they want to include the other fifty percent of the population,” she was quoted as saying among the volume of press she garnered at the time. She was a noteworthy trailblazer on multiple fronts.
Lucille began her real estate career in 1977. In 1984, she and then partners Marty Texeira and Sam Sylvia purchased the property at 8 Federal Street (at that time home of Something Natural), renovated the building, and opened Sylvia and Jordan Real Estate. Just three years later, she bought out her partners and established Jordan Real Estate which still operates in the same location today. Over the years, as her success grew exponentially, she became a mentor to many professionals still working in the field today. After surviving both cancer and intense treatment in 2007, she decided that it was time to sell her interest in the business, to travel, and to spend time with her family.
Fun loving, caring and generous, Lucille was passionate about what and whom she loved. Until the day she died, she invested in working people on Nantucket. She encouraged and supported her staff and associates in home ownership, offered financial assistance to small, year-round businesses she believed in, and championed arts and education in the community in many ways. Privately, she was a stalwart ally among her fellow cancer survivors.
During the past several years, Lucille split her time between Nantucket, Warren, PA and Calistoga, CA—near to her son and his family. She came back to Nantucket to enjoy the off-season months with her many close friends here. Wherever she happened to be, she was learning and studying, immersing herself at the residence programs at the Chautauqua Institute, for example. She explored her spiritual self via a dedicated meditation practice. She loved swimming, kayaking, exploring new walks and hikes, and traveling.
Lucille is survived by her siblings and their spouses Lynn Bentz, Leslie and Alfred Tarquinio, Bruce and Gail Ehrenberger, Michael and Carol Ehrenberger; son Ehren Jordan and his family: her grandchildren Audrey, Vivian, Mason and Wyatt Jordan, her daughter-in-law Erin Jordan and former daughter-in-law Anne-Marie Failla-Jordan.
A Celebration of her Life will be held June 29, 2024 at 11:00 AM at the Unitarian Universalist Meeting House, 11 Orange Street, Nantucket, MA. Donations may be made in her name to the Lucille Jordan Memorial Scholarship at the Children’s House of Nantucket.