History
Ted Kord: 1988 - 2005
Meet Theodore Kord, the only child of Thomas Kord, at one time the richest man in America, and his ex-sife, Dolores Winters, a Hollywood actress. Ted was not yet born when his parents divorced, Ted's father used high-priced lawyers to ensure he would win sole custody of his son. Still, considering his parents, Ted was a born celebrity and as he grew older, he became more interesting. At age three, Kord family doctors noted that Ted's mental development was beyond remarkable and thus Thomas provided his son with the best mentors and experts.
After a few years of this, Ted had little interest in being mentored and would sabotage his mentor's lessons by pulling elaborate pranks. Deciding that his son needed a friend, Thomas Kord had his chief of security, Jonah Carter, bring his son to the mentoring sessions and scheduled playdates. Though he had objections to having a "bought" friend, Ted and Michael Jon Carter became the best friends and partners in their elaborate pranks, much to their fathers' dismay, still at least Ted was managed. This arrangement lasted for a couple years.
When the boys' fathers died in a plane crash, Ted was thirteen and due to his age, his entire inheritance and Kord Omniversal was managed by a team of high-priced lawyers until Ted turned of legal age. In the meantime, Ted was sent to live with his mother who he had little to no relationship with. When Ted discovered how fast his inheritance was being squandered, he went to court and had himself declared legally emancipated, thus earning the right to personally oversee his vast inheritance.
After news broke of Kord Omniversal being run by a teenage boy, the company almost didn't survive the freefall, but in two years's time, Kord Omniversal was seeing record profits, most of it coming out of R&D arm: Kord-Tech, which Ted was personally overseeing. Ted had big plans in store for the cutting edge tech he was designing... but for his plan to work, Ted was going to need a friend he could count on. He could only think of one person for this job.[1]
Blue Beetle: 2005 -2009
Missing Data
Blue Beetle:2009 - Present
On the heels of their time with the Titans and their short-lived adventures in Hub City, Ted turned to Coast City with Michael Jon Carter and reclaimed control of his company from his uncle, Jarvis Kord. With his company back under his control, Ted once again had access to his workshop and the alien device that he had used to base his and Booster's gadgetry on, and so he began to give their crimefighting gear a much needed upgrade. As Ted was busy with this, Booster Gold became obsessed with bolstering their "portfolio".
After being invited to join the Justice League, Ted had a short-lived romance with Tora Olafsdotter but got dumped in favor of Guy Gardner. Naturally, Ted took this rather hard and he may have retreated to his workshop for much of 2010. Supposedly, when Michael was finally able to convince Ted to come back to superheroics, he had gained some weight and couldn't fit back into his suit and required a month to get back into shape. I only know this because Booster likes to remind Ted of this, occasionally calling him "Blimpy Beetle"
Still carying on his prankish ways, Ted often kills downtime during monitor duty planning elaborate pranks which he will later carry out with Booster. The League's more serious heroes tend to be their targets, though Ted Kord has a strict "no messing with Batman" policy, on account of his deep desire to have Batman's approval.
On one very well known instance, Ted and Michael found J'onn's Choco stashes in both the Hall of Justice and the Watchtower and made a concerted effort to not only empty out every box the martian's sandwich cookies, leaving the hollowed out cartons for J'onn to find; but then they also hid the contents of the boxes in the Bug and then proceeded to go to every one of J'onn's store within a three mile radius of the Hall of Justice and buy out their supply of Chocos. Needles to say, J'onn had a bit of a nearly nuclear-meltdown while Ted and Michael nearly peed themselves from laughter.
On a personal note, I am well-aware that Ted has developed a huge crush on me though I have been honest with Ted, he still seems to hope that Dick'll never come to his senses.[2]
Trivia and Notes
Trivia
- Blue Beetle joined the Justice League in 2009 nominated by Batman.
- Jonah Carter (Michael's father) died in the same plane crash.
- He and Booster Gold have a signature laughter: Bwah-ha-ha.
Links and References
- Appearances of Ted Kord
- Character Gallery: Ted Kord