Thorn Lord

Balfour Bowen Thorn Lord (August 24, 1906 – June 16, 1965) was an American lawyer and Democratic politician from New Jersey.

Biography Lord was born on August 24, 1906, in Plainfield, New Jersey, to Carroll P. Lord, a New England cotton merchant, and Frances E. Troy of Asheville, North Carolina. The family moved South two years later. He graduated from The University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, and received a law degree from the University of North Carolina in 1931.

In 1932, he set up a law practice in Trenton, New Jersey. He served as Assistant United States Attorney and then as U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey from 1943 to 1945.

Lord became active in Mercer County politics, first elected to the Lawrence Township committee in 1947. The following year, he took control of the Mercer County Democratic organization and became a powerful force in state Democratic politics. Meyner appointed Lord to the board of the Port Authority.

Lord and his first wife Margaret Eastburn had one child, Thorn Jr. After a divorce, he married Nina Underwood, ex-wife of David Hunter McAlpin, Jr. They had a daughter, also named Nina. By 1965, the Lords were separated. Apparently depressed by the estrangement, Lord killed himself by garroting with an electric shaver cord at the home of a friend in Princeton.