HINCKLEY, MINN. – How exactly it came to pass that the Governor's Deer Opener here this weekend is being spearheaded by a Minnesota Deer Hunters Association (MDHA) chapter named for a Wisconsin hunter is a twisted tale indeed.
Highlights include a world record whitetail buck, an unusual caliber Winchester, a dance hall and — why not? — a tavern.
Star of this yarn, which is more saga than story, is Jim Jordan, who died in 1978 at age 86. It is for Jordan the Hinckley area MDHA chapter is named.
Born in Hinckley, Jordan was married and living just outside Danbury, Wis., in 1914 when he was 22. According to published accounts by outdoors writer Mark LaBarbera and Hinckley area innkeeper John O'Reilly, Jordan made a living trapping and logging.
He also hunted, and about six inches of new snow covered the ground in November 1914 on the day Jordan and a pal, Eachus Davis, followed the Soo Line tracks south of Danbury and crossed the Yellow River before continuing on for another mile or so.
Times were tough. Davis reportedly couldn't afford a 50-cent hunting license, and Jordan had only five bullets for his rifle, one of which he used to kill a doe soon into the hunt. Davis, it is said, dragged that animal back to Danbury, while Jordan continued to hunt, following not only the railroad tracks, but a set of unusually large deer tracks.
Soon, a train approached, and its whistle prompted as many as four deer, including a monster buck with a spectacular rack, to jump up from tall grass about 50 yards away. Shooting three times at the big animal, Jordan would say later, "I thought I hit him solidly."
He hadn't.