Longtime broadcast journalist Robert Jordan has launched three video businesses and a non-profit foundation to chronicle the stories of veterans and other seniors in free videos. (Photo courtesy of Robert Jordan)

Longtime broadcast journalist Robert Jordan and his wife, Sharon, leave the house a half-hour earlier than needed on movie nights.

It is not to ensure they get their favorite seats or to pick through the box of Dots dividing up their favorite flavors. It’s to make sure they get in their seats by showtime.

“I get stopped by people in the popcorn line,” Jordan laughed. “I get stopped by people in the butter line. I get stopped by people in the soft-drink line. You pass it on. It’s been going on for 50 years. It is just part of our life.”

One of the most familiar faces in Chicago TV news, Jordan said people enjoy talking to him, telling him about stories he did that touched them. He enjoys talking with them as well, he said, always wanting to hear their stories and their connection to him and WGN, his broadcast home for more than 40 years.

“It used to be people wanted an autograph,” Jordan said. “Now, everyone wants a selfie.”

With WGN being a superstation, Jordan is even recognized while on vacation or on assignment in foreign countries.

Jordan, who did his final newscast in September, will receive a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Chicago Headline Club on May 12. Chicago Tribune columnist Mary Schmich will also receive a Lifetime Achievement Award at the event.

Jordan said he has not felt any withdrawal since stepping away from the WGN anchor desk, crediting his agent with structuring the broadcast journalist’s last three-year contract in a way that lessened his on-air work as it progressed.

“My agent was smart enough to negotiate my final deal in a way to wean me off,” Jordan said.

However, Jordan is not ready for retirement just yet. In fact, the 73-year-old Lincolnwood resident is far from it. He has launched three video businesses and a nonprofit foundation. All four entities focus on sharing information through videos.

“I am still storytelling. I am still writing. I am still doing video,” Jordan said. “I am not sitting in the La-Z-Boy doing nothing.”

Jordan’s entities include a firm doing genealogy pieces for high-end clients, chronicling a family’s heritage. Although the $95,000 price tag may raise some eyebrows, Jordan pointed out that his team spends six to eight months on every video to ensure it’s thorough and a well-polished production.

The foundation that Jordan formed will chronicle the stories of veterans and other noteworthy seniors, providing a free lasting memory for the individual’s family. Jordan sees the videos, which will start being shot this month, as a way to ensure the stories of veterans with Alzheimer’s or terminal illnesses get recorded and are remembered in their respective families.

Jordan also wrote a book that will be coming out in November, looking at how television news covers murders.

“If it’s a black kid, stations may not even cover it unless it is two or three kids,” Jordan said. “But if that same kid is on his way to school with books in his hand, they are all over it.”

Jordan surveyed television news decision makers on the calls they would make in certain scenarios as part of the book.

Except for a two-year stint with the CBS News Midwest Bureau (1978-80), Jordan spent his entire broadcast career at WGN. He still represents the station at banquets and other functions.

He interviewed U.S. presidents one-on-one, talked with heads of state, drew information from business leaders, and told the stories of average citizens.

“I’ve talked to people from all walks of life,” Jordan said.

One person he never got to interview was Cuban leader Fidel Castro.

“I never got to him. He was so controversial, but Cubans loved him,” Jordan said.

“I got this close,” Jordan said, putting his left index finger and thumb an inch from each other, but added that the planned interview fell apart at the last minute.

For a man who has been part of many historic local and national events, Jordan does not have many things that stick in his craw. There is one, though.

“A big regret is that I didn’t keep a diary,” Jordan said.

Jordan said he can look back at his time in TV news with pride, feeling he gave people information they needed and told them the whole story, something he says that doesn’t always happen in TV news today.

“It’s been a wonderful career, chock full of meaningful times,” Jordan said. “I am starting to understand why old guys go and sit around McDonald’s and tell stories. I’m one of them now.”

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— Even off air, Robert Jordan remains a storyteller —