By Ruth Ann Ruiz
The Post Newspaper Features Editor
He spreads happiness and smiles and has a lighthearted attitude which brings down the anxiety level that is skyrocketing in our post-pandemic society. He listens for the needs that are expressed in the community and finds a way to deliver something of substance to assist with those needs.
Dash Gordon was born in March 2022, but Tim Glover, the man in the costume, has been living for 57 years and his own attitude towards people in need wasn’t always as generous as Dash Gordon’s.
“I’m not an overly compassionate person, but since I’ve taken on Dash Gordon, I’ve been seeing stuff behind the scenes that has filled my heart with compassion,” shared Tim.
Dash or Tim — whichever name you wish to call him is okay by him — lived in several different foster homes and two children’s shelters as a child in Ponchatoula, Louisiana.
His birth parents loved their children but because of their lifestyles, they couldn’t provide him and his sisters with the simple normalcy of food on the table, a place to sleep or even the quietness of sleep.
Children and family services would remove him, and his two sisters and his parents would work to get them back.
Tim, aka Dash, at the tender age of 8, had made up his mind that he and his sisters needed to go live in a place with some semblance of normalcy and he pleaded with his parents to let them go.
“I remember the last day in my parent’s home, we came home from school and police were there to escort my sisters and I to Methodist Home for Children,” said Tim.
He and his sisters were adopted.
Love for his birth parents never left his heart even though he had been in a home with regular meals and normalcy. Right after high school, he made his way to upstate New York to reunite with his birth parents.
His intuition to visit his parents sadly provided him with the chance to have a final good-bye. His mom died of an overdose shortly after he arrived in the Rochester area; she was only 38 years old. Tim was 17. His father died two months after his mother’s passing.
The Army took Tim into their fold after his parents’ death. After his Army days were over, he attended culinary school and then worked as a chef for several years. But his true calling came in and he shifted over to car salesman for 32 years. Next, he moved into corporate training, which is currently his career.
Though his childhood was a rough path, he has memories of the freedom he had to hop on a trolly and spend the day catching beads at Mardi Gras parades. This perhaps sounds a bit unhealthy for a child, but his youthful ability to find the joy and brightness of life kept him from developing destructive habits of his own.
Flash forward to 2021 and Tim, along with his wife, decided they didn’t want to bust into their regular budget for a vacation to Jamaica. So as a couple, they elected to sign up with Door Dash and deliver food to the residents of League City.
Tim was the partner in the duo who delivered the food, and his wife was his copilot in their journey to building their vacation piggy bank. Their entrepreneurial endeavor had a secondary effect, it brought the couple some much needed couple time riding around League City together.
This spring, Tim decided to have a little fun with the clients and send a text saying, “be there in a dash signed Dash” and added a picture of the comic super hero Flash Gordon. The couple’s food delivery was morphing to something more, something unique and something filled with happiness.
“People liked our humorous text messages and would come to the door to meet me rather than just have me leave their food outside. That’s when I got the idea to get a Flash Gordon costume to wear for door dashing,” shared Tim.
With a costume, he needed his own unique name and came up with Dash Gordon. Dash added a fun pair of oversized sunglasses and continued delivering food along with bringing his bright red costumed self to the service. His customers were ecstatic, and he became the talk of the town.
“Now if I’m out delivering in costume or just with my sunglasses, kids in a car next to me start to point and people get excited to see Dash Gordon,” said Tim.
As Dash (and no longer just Tim), he heard the pleas of a single mom on social media seeking assistance. That was when Tim/Dash’s heart melted, and he began to seek ways to provide help to people in need.
The City of League City heard of his growing fame, and they added to the fire of his popularity by creating a video documenting the famous Dash Gordon out and about in the community. Then he got calls from Houston media to be interviewed. Word of Dash Gordon was making its way across the region.
Food delivery propelled Dash out into the community, and now he delivers his happy uplifting spirit for a diverse collection of people and services. He steps in for nursing homes who request a visit from Dash. He makes special deliveries of donated Happy Meals to gatherings of children. Wherever he goes, he brings smiles to the faces of those who greet him.
His philanthropist enterprise has grown quickly; he is so busy his wife has taken over scheduling his appearances. Tim plans to continue his superhero role for as long as the community needs him or until he runs out of steam, which from his energy level might be a long way into the future.
