 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 
|
|
 |
||||||||||||||||
|
Bar News - July 27, 2001 Members Celebrate 50 Years in the Practice of Law REACHING THE 50-year mark in a chosen profession is a milestone for anyone, including those attorneys who this year are celebrating their 50th anniversary in the practice of law. These attorneys have seen NH’s legal community grow from a small, close-knit bar to a much larger, less familial group of lawyers. For the first time, this year’s group of 50-year members was honored at the NHBA 2001 Annual Meeting, held June 21-24. These members were traditionally honored at the Bar’s Mid-Winter Meeting. Following are a list of this year’s 50-year honorees and profiles of some of the honored members. Additional profiles have appeared in previous issues and will continue in a future issue of Bar News. 50-Year Members
Joseph E. Michael, Jr. When Joseph E. Michael Jr. retired from the bench of Durham District Court in 1994 at the mandatory retirement age of 70, his 40 years of service made him the judge with the longest continuous service in New Hampshire, according to a commendation he received from the governor. Michael sat on the bench of Durham District Court as an associate justice from 1954 to 1994. He was appointed to the bench just four years after being admitted to the bar. Michael attended Dartmouth College for one year before going into military service. He served in the US Army Air Corps during World War II, from 1941 to 1943. After returning from service, Michael returned to Dartmouth to earn his under graduate degree. Michael was encouraged to pursue his desire to become a lawyer by his father, a Lebanese immigrant who always wanted to be an attorney himself. "All my life it’s what I wanted to be," Michael said. He worked his way through law school and earned his law degree from Boston University in 1950. Admitted to the Bar in 1950, Michael started his own law office in Rochester, practicing mostly corporate and estate law. Soon after he opened the office, he hired attorney Steve Lawless, who later became his partner, but who died just five years later. Michael continued to expand his law firm; it grew to five attorneys and four paralegals. Then, in 1998, he sold his interest in the firm and became of counsel with Dale F. Swanson, an attorney in Michael’s hometown of Durham. "There are fewer headaches (than running your own firm), no worries about employees," Michael said. "I’m back practicing as I did 50 years ago. This is a nice time in my life." During his career, Michael did a lot of corporate work, sitting on the boards of two banks and five financial institutions. But it was during his years as a district court judge that Michael experienced the most memorable cases of his legal career. These included a set of civil disobedience cases in the tumultuous ‘60s. About a dozen defendants were arrested for using Durham roads during a permitted parade; the parade permit specified that only sidewalks could be used, to avoid blocking traffic. During this politically charged decade, many of the out-of-town defendants brought in civil rights attorneys from New York City, some from the American Civil Liberties Union, to defend them. One defendant wouldn’t rise in court and went on a hunger strike, Michael recalls. Eventually all of the defendants were found guilty, fined $50 and given suspended sentences. One appealed the decision and years later his charges were dropped. During this case, Michael came home to find a package on his doorstep that he feared was a bomb. He and his family were evacuated from the house and the bomb squad removed the package. It was later found to be a threat of a different kind – a model of a guillotine with a head in a basket. Despite that difficult case, Michael has fond memories of his years of practice as a lawyer and judge. He enjoyed the "fraternity" of the profession years ago, he said. "You had the great pleasure of arguing like hell with attorneys in the courtroom and going out to lunch or dinner with them after. There was no real animosity. The practice of law was so different then," he said. Michael said that one of his greatest accomplishments was finding real pleasure in his job. "I enjoyed every day that I got up and went to the office," he said. Michael and his wife of 52 years, Shirley, have a son, daughter and four grandchildren. Michael said that when he’s not practicing law, he keeps himself busy traveling with his wife and fishing. Stanley C. Urban Still an active member of the Bar, Stanley C. Urban is an estate tax attorney for the Internal Revenue Service, where he has worked for the last 37 years. He examines the federal estate and gift taxes and worked in the Boston office for 25 years before transferring to the Manchester office 11 years ago. "We deal with big estates, going up against the biggest firms," said Urban. "It’s very interesting, challenging work." Although he has spent most of his 50-year law career working for the IRS, Urban was first in private practice in Nashua for several years. Some of his most interesting moments in private practice came during the national Communism scare and the McCarthy hearings. At that time, New Hampshire had instituted its own program to investigate communism. Three of Urban’s early clients were individuals subpoenaed to appear before Attorney General Louis Wyman to answer questions about possible involvement with Communism. "People he subpoenaed had trouble getting attorneys to represent them. I was probably one of the first to appear with them," he said. No action was taken against Urban’s clients after Wyman questioned them. Before embarking on his law career, Urban served in the Navy during World War II, stationed on a small aircraft carrier in the Pacific. After his military service he attended New England College, St. Anselm’s College and the University of New Hampshire to earn his undergraduate degree. Urban graduated from Boston College Law School in 1951, the same year he was admitted to the NH Bar. In 1961 he earned his Master of Laws in taxation from Boston University Law. He began working as an estate tax attorney for the IRS soon after and said he currently has no plans to retire. "As long as the work remains interesting, I’ll keep doing it," Urban said. Urban and his wife, Stephanie, have been married for 53 years and reside in Nashua. They have five children and five grandchildren. John J. Wholey After serving in the US Navy Air Corps from 1943 to 1945, John J. Wholey earned an undergraduate degree in liberal arts/history from Boston College, but upon graduation he discovered that jobs for someone with such a degree were limited. His college roommate was heading off to law school, "so I went along," he said. Wholey graduated from BC Law in 1951, was admitted to the NH Bar and opened a solo practice in Portsmouth. It was a general practice; he did a lot of probate, tort and criminal work and "anything else that came through the door," he said. Wholey said that the most memorable moments from his career were "incidents of humor" – camaraderie among members of a then more familial bar. "The years have been pretty uneventful other than that," he said. The major change that Wholey has seen in the Bar over the years, he said, is the marked increase in the number of women attorneys. He believes that judges today are much more serious and "stick to the case," as opposed to the sometimes laid-back atmosphere of the courtroom in days past. Wholey’s law career was partnered with a career in local politics – he served as the mayor of Portsmouth three times and as its city solicitor (now called city attorney). He remains an active attorney, now practicing with his son-in-law, Bernard W. Pelech, at Portsmouth’s Pelech & Wholey, but eight years ago health problems forced him to begin phasing himself out of the practice. "I’ve been trying, but the customers keep coming back," he said. Recent heart trouble means that Wholey has to complete that phasing- out process. "Right now I’m working on getting back to health and surviving," he said. Wholey and his wife of 52 years, Betty, have two daughters and two grandchildren.
|
|
Home | About the Bar | For Members | For the Public | Legal Links | Publications | Online Store New Hampshire Bar Association |
