The news this week got me to thinking about lawyers, particularly good lawyers who were established and successful when I started this profession in 1978. Two men who I considered giants in the profession passed to the other side this week, and I have only kind thoughts and pleasant memories of them.
Bob Ruberg was a very kind and sweet man, treated me with utmost courtesy and compassion, and has left a professional legacy with his excellent law firm and his two lawyers sons - Don and Mike. In the past few years I only saw Bob at the northern Kentucky bar annual holiday dinner, but it was always very cordial and pleasant experience. I will miss Bob greatly.
Willie Mathis, Jr. also passed away this week. When I started practice he was the Commonwealth's Atty. for Boone Gallatin Counties and was a member of a successful firm, Mathis, Dallas and Frohlich. Willie left the practice a few years ago via retirement and was enjoying life, I am told. I saw him occasionally, usually at bar events, and our relationship continued to be strong through the years and miles. Willie was a fine prosecutor, a keen businessman and a good friend. I will miss Willie, also.
I made the decision several years ago to get deeply involved in Bar Association activities. I was President of the Kenton County Bar when a group of us formed the Northern KY Bar Association.I was on the board and later led that organization. That has led me to my current status as Vice President of the Kentucky Bar Association. I will leave Thursday for two days of meetings called the KBA Board of Governors summer meeting. This year, the meetings will be held at Kentucky Dam Village, very close to Pres. elect Doug Myers' lake house. I have never been there before and am looking forward to a jaunt deep into Western Kentucky. In early August I will attend the American Bar Association convention in Toronto - another place I have not been to, Erlanger's Bill Robinson will become ABA President during the convention (and his Mayor will be there to cheer him on!)
Typically no discipline is taken up at the summer meeting as it is the first meeting of the new board and a great deal of time is spent in training the new board members and handling other programs and missions of the bar. The last board meeting of the year is held the Tuesday before the convention starts, and we had enough discipline that meeting to last a while (Stan Chesley and Jay Bamberger.) A lot of bonding takes place as the new board will have to work together through some very difficult activities.
My experience has shown me that the vast majority of people elected to the board and to office are excellent attorneys , leaders in their particular area of the Commonwealth, and dedicated to the improvement of the practice of law and the system of justice in our Commonwealth. Very infrequently people with agendas or bones to pick are elected to the board and they are uniformly unsuccessful. I look forward to working with them all, old and new.
I am of the age now where many attorneys who served as mentors and/or teachers to me have retired and are leaving us for a different world. A few weeks ago, Judge William Schmedecke and Gerry Patton. This week, Bob and Willie. I know it is a part of life and I accept God's will, but I don't like it. These people have left marks on northern Kentucky that will last for generations. It is only my hope that my work with the Kentucky Bar Association also helps my brothers and sisters at the bar way that the Judge, Jerry , Bob and Willie helped me. God God bless them.
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