Chief Judge John P. Shonkwiler of the 6th Circuit has been a circuit judge for 35 years, a milestone that was chronicled in a feature story in the Jan. 29 issue of the Decatur Herald and Review.

A lawyer for 45 years – since graduation in 1962 from the Northwestern University School of Law – his tenure as a jurist actually extends from his 1965 appointment as a Macon County magistrate. He was president of the Illinois Magistrate's Association in 1970-71.

Shonkwiler became an associate judge in 1971, due to judicial reform, and was appointed to the circuit court a year later when Judge Burl A. Edie retired. He was elected in 1974 and retained each six years since then.

The third generation of Piatt County lawyers, Shonkwiler practiced with his father, Robert P. Shonkwiler, in Monticello for three years after graduation. His grandfather, F. M. Shonkwiler, was a judge when the county courthouse opened in 1903.

The judicial career of John Shonkwiler includes his remarkable string of five straight three-year terms as the six-county circuit's chief judge, dating back to the 1994 retirement of Rodney A. Scott.

He also has been a fixture on the ISBA Committee on Judicial Advisory Polls since 1980. He was its chair in 1987-88, after which he received a Board of Governors Award.

Shonkwiler chaired the Bench and Bar Section Council in 1988-89 and served on the ISBA Assembly from 1984 to 1989. He has been a member of the Traffic Laws and Courts Section Council, the Task Force on Gender Bias, the Committee on Handicapped Lawyers and the Committee on Bar Elections.

The Decatur newspaper account describes the chief judge as “an engaging, empathetic man with deep brown eyes, white hair and a steady smile.” It notes that he “is too busy to contemplate his retirement,” although he will be 74 on April 5.

Shonkwiler told the reporter that his father “was the best teacher that anyone could possibly want.” His name is still stenciled on the window of their former office, not far from the judge's wood-paneled courthouse chambers.

A past president of the Illinois Judges Association and recipient of its Award of Merit, Shonkwiler has received an Illinois Senate commendation for intergovernmental cooperation and child support enforcement.