100th birthday wishes for oldest RCVS member

We can imagine what the response would be if we were to spend retention fees on sending members birthday cards.

However, when we learned that our oldest member, Miss Marjorie Jordan (pictured), was to celebrate her 100th birthday, we made an exception and sent her a framed scroll and small gift to mark the occasion.

Miss Jordan initially enrolled at Liverpool University, transferring to the Royal Veterinary College shortly after the RVC started to accept female students. She found, however, that resistance within the profession towards accepting women made it difficult to secure a student placement.

Fortunately, through her own tenacity – and the intervention of her pathology professor – she was offered a position at a practice in Sevenoaks, Kent, which led to an assistant’s role after she qualified in 1931.

Locum work brought the opportunity to join a mixed practice in Dorking to build up the small animal side and she eventually took over the practice, running it single-handedly for many years before taking on a partner.

Retiring in the mid-1960s, she remained as a sleeping partner until the practice was sold.

As well as her veterinary career, Miss Jordan has a long-standing interest in Staffordshire Bull Terriers. She was a founder member of the Southern Counties Staffordshire Bull Terrier Society and was later made a Life Vice-President.

She has judged Staffordshires in many shows, and was first woman to judge the breed at Crufts.