A three-term county magistrate, lifelong Clark County farmer and innovator Joe McCord Jr. loved two things.

“He loved his family and he loved his farm,” said Sheila McCord, his wife of 54 years.

McCord Jr. passed away Thursday at age 73.

McCord Jr. was elected to the Clark County Fiscal Court in November 2008 when the county was nearly broke. Former Clark County Judge-Executive Henry Branham, who was county treasurer at the time, remembers a number of conversations with the magistrates.

“Joe was one who gathered his information and he may talk to you again in a day or two when he’d thought it out,” Branham said. “He never got shaken about anything.”

Part of that was his intentional nature, Branham said.

“Joe would not say anything off the cuff,” he said. “Everything he said was deliberate.”

Convincing McCord to run in the first place took a lot of convincing, Sheila McCord said.

“There was a group of people in Wayland Heights,” she said. “Hap Cox and Nellie Jenkins were the instigators in getting Joe to run for magistrate. He’s not a politician. He’s a farmer.”

He thought being stubborn and used to doing things his way might fit in well, Sheila laughed.

“He thoroughly enjoyed it when he got on there,” she said. “After he did it once, he thought it was pretty cool and he’d do it again.”

The task before the court was to make it financially stable once again.

“The county was broke when he went it and when he left, the county was on reasonably solid financial ground,” Sheila said, “and he was proud of that. He was all about helping the county and the county employees.”

McCord Jr. served three consecutive terms before being defeated in 2010 when the the fiscal court changed from seven magistrates to three county commissioners.

All the time, McCord Jr. was farming and trying new things. Through the decades, Sheila McCord said they grew tobacco and hay, raised sheep and cattle, and experimented with freshwater shrimp and tilapia. In recent years, he offered recreational quail hunts on his property. she said.

They always grew vegetables, and founded the Clark County Farmers’ Market.

“He was the first in Kentucky to raise tobacco in greenhouses,” she said.

After the quail hunts, she said he went back to his love of making furniture from cherry and walnut wood from the family farm.

“He was always wanting to try something new,” she said.

McCord is survived by two sons, six grandchildren and one great granddaughter, among others.

The funeral will be at 1 p.m. Wednesday, May 8, at Scobee Funeral Home. Visitation will begin at 11 a.m.