Epilogue

As highly respected as Donald Hubert was in the Chicago legal arena, he had few more passionate admirers than those in the Hales Franciscan High School community.

A past president of the Chicago Bar Association and founder of the Hubert Law Group, he was, in his own quiet way, an ardent moral and financial supporter of an educational institution that would have been defunct without him.

Mr. Hubert died Nov. 27 at age 58 of a heart attack while vacationing in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, with his 12-year-old daughter, Jessica. His wife, Mellonie, died in 2000 of a heart condition.

A graduate of Hales Franciscan who delivered groceries to earn tuition money, Mr. Hubert reportedly donated $82,000, almost all of his first legal fee, to the prep school so could remain open for future students.

He subsequently agreed to chair a $15 million fund-raising campaign that began two years ago, and he persuaded Chicago basketball legend Michael Jordan to contribute $1 million.

A 1973 graduate of the University of Michigan Law School who was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1974, Mr. Hubert first practiced in the Illinois attorney general's office.

He was subsequently with Adam Bourgeois & Associates and George C. Howard & Associates before establishing his own firm in 1981.

Past chair of the Illinois Supreme Court Committee on Professional Responsibility, Mr. Hubert was co-chair of the Cook County Committee on Courts for the 21st Century and a member of the ISBA Special Committee on the Future of the Profession.

He served on the Civil Justice Reform Act Advisory Group for the U.S. District Court, the Illinois Labor Relations Board, the Chicago Public Library Board, the Mayor's Advisory Committee to the Department of Administrative Hearings, and the Archdiocese of Chicago Committee on School Funding.

Also a member of the Governor's Commission on Capital Punishment, he testified in June 2002 before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on the commission's report, “Reducing the Risk of Executing the Innocent.”

Mr. Hubert was a special assistant Chicago corporation counsel, general counsel for Harvey School District 152 and outside counsel to the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services.

Earlier this year, he accepted a Justice John Paul Stevens Award from the Chicago Bar Association after previously declining the honor. He also declined induction as a Laureate of the ISBA Academy of Illinois Lawyers.

In 1997, Mr. Hubert and ISBA President Ralph A. Gabric jointly received the Carl H. Rolewick Award from the Lawyers' Assistance Fund for their efforts to secure a stable funding base.

Highland Park attorney Michael Frank Bonamarte III died Nov. 5 at age 50. A 1981 graduate of the DePaul University College of Law, he was a former commissioner of Deerfield Township.

Survivors include a son, Michael F. Bonamarte IV of Levin & Perconti, Chicago.

Retired Cook County Judge Glynn J. Elliott Jr. died Nov. 8 at age 80 after suffering a ruptured aortic aneurysm. He was the son and former law partner of Glynn J. Elliott, who died in 1970.

A 1951 graduate of the Loyola University School of Law, Mr. Elliott was senior partner in Elliott, Carrane, Freifeld & Uruba until 1983, when he appointed to the circuit court. He was elected in 1984 and retired in 2002.

Mr. Elliott presided over post-judgment collections and developed garnishment procedures that were adopted in amendments to the Illinois Wage Deduction Act.

Retired Washington, Ill., attorney Donald Lyle Dorward died Oct. 20 at age 81 in his home. He had law degrees from Franklin University (1961) and Capitol University (1966), both in Columbus, Ohio, and a master's degree from Oregon State College.

Mr. Dorward was a partner in a Columbus firm from 1962 to 1964, a solo practitioner in Worthington until 1968, and a partner in two more Columbus firms until 1977. He was admitted to the Illinois bar that year and practiced in Washington until 1994.

Retired attorney Constantine George Drugas of Frankfort died Nov. 5 at age 76 in Elmhurst Memorial Hospital. A 1955 graduate of the Northwestern University School of Law after Army service in Korea, he was a past president of the Hellenic Bar Association of Illinois.

Chicago attorney Arthur Irwin Gould, who was to be honored Dec. 6 as an ISBA Senior Counsellor, died Nov. 21, at age 77. He was of counsel to Dykema Gossett.

A 1956 graduate of the Northwestern University School of Law, Mr. Gould began his career as a trial lawyer in the Tax Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.

He subsequently joined Winston & Strawn and was made a partner in 1969. He later practiced with Mayer, Brown & Platt and Rooks, Pitts & Poust.

Retired banking attorney William John McGirr, a resident of River Forest, died Oct. 14 At age 69. A 1970 graduate of Harvard Law School, he has a master's degree in business administration from the University of Chicago.

Mr. McGirr practiced in the trust departments of the Continental Bank and J.P. Morgan Chase Bank.

Maxine Hirsch Meyers, a graduate of the Washington University Law School who lived in Chicago but was not registered to practice, died Nov. 12 at age 56.

An art collector, she wrote three novels and several short stories about the struggles of women in society.

Retired Chicago labor attorney Edward Boone Miller died Nov. 10 at age 84 of Alzheimer's disease in Sunrise Assisted Living, Wilmette.

A 1947 graduate of the University of Wisconsin Law School who was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1948, Mr. Miller served in the Naval Reserve and had been stationed in the Philippines during World War II.

He was a partner in Pope, Ballard, Shepherd & Fowle until the firm dissolved in 1994. He then joined Seyfarth Shaw and retired in 2003.

Mr. Miller was appointed chair of the National Labor Relations Board in 1970, despite opposition from unions because his clients were in corporate management.

The author of two books on labor law, he wrote a poem for the 60th anniversary of the NLRB that ridiculed criticism that the board was biased for either labor or management.

Retired Chicago tax attorney and certified public accountant Lowell Jack Myers died Nov. 7 at age 76 of a brain aneurysm in a Rockville, Md., nursing home.

Mr. Myers lost his hearing as a child and became a legal advocate for the deaf, urging passage of legislation to provide mandatory interpreters in police interrogations and court proceedings.

While an accountant for Sears, Roebuck & Co. for 30 years, he took night classes at The John Marshall Law School and graduated in 1956. He built a practice in the deaf community that included successful representation of Donald Lang in a murder case.

Mr. Myers was the author of “The Law and the Deaf,” a book about legal issues involving the hearing impaired.

Chicago attorney Joseph Peck died Nov. 30 at age 81 of a heart attack in his home. A 1956 graduate of the DePaul University College of Law and veteran of service in the Air Force, he was to be honored Dec. 6 as an ISBA Senior Counsellor.

Mr. Peck was the principal of Joseph Peck & Associates, and of counsel to Peck, Bloom, Austriaco & Mitchell. Survivors include a son, Kerry R. Peck of the Peck Bloom firm, a past president of the Chicago Bar Association.

Former Chicago attorney Raymond Shaheen, a resident of Sanford, Fla., died Dec. 2 at age 88. A Navy pilot during World War II, he was a 1949 graduate of the DePaul University College of Law.

Mr. Shaheen was senior partner of Shaheen, Novoselsky, Staat & Filipowski when he retired.

Retired Cook County associate judge Michael Francis Sheehan Jr., a Chicago attorney, died in November at age 72. A 1962 graduate of the DePaul University College of Law, he was a partner in Deming & Sheehan when he was appointed to the 1st Municipal District in 1989.

Retired Waterloo attorney Edgar Oliver Zimmer died Nov. 18 at age 102 in Columbia. A 1931 graduate of the University of Illinois College of Law, he was Monroe County state's attorney from 1936 to 1960.

He and his wife established the Edgar and Bonnie Zimmer Law Scholarship at the Southern Illinois University School of Law in 1984, and the Zimmer Family Foundation in 1997 to provide college scholarships.