Temple University School of Law - Restatement Yearbook (Philadelphia, PA)

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William Alexander Brown as Dean and S. Stanger Iszard, .f. Claude Bedford, J. Howard Rhoads and Francis Chapman as teaching members of the faculty along with Crawford Dawes I Idling, afterward a member of the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania Law School and now State Reporter of New Hampshire. About 1903 the faculty was joined by H. R. Schermerhorn, Ksq., one of the most efficient teachers the school ever had. Greatly loved by his pupils who were attracted by his gracious personality and scholarly methods, Mr. Schermerhorn left behind him a memory which still pervades the school to which he dedicated his “Essentials of Tort Actions.” William L. Kinter, Ksq., Assistant General Solicitor of the Philadelphia Reading Railway Co., is another well-known lawyer who for a time was an honored and valued member of the faculty. .1. Howard Rhoads was another member of the faculty who for years aided very greatly in placing the school on its present firm foundation, teaching Corporation and Partnership Law and Constitutional Law. Mr. Rhoads was deservedly popular with his students until his health compelled him to give up his work. Walter C. Douglas, Jr., Esq., formerly Assistant l S. Attorney, now Referee in Bankruptcy and Secretary and Deputy Examiner of the State Board, became a member of the faculty in 1911, and continued until 191(5 during which time he greatly endeared himself to the student hotly. He was succeeded by Hon. Charles E. Bartlett, then Assistant District Attorney, now President Judge of Court of Common Pleas No. 1. Dean Brown ceased his connection with the school in 1906 and in 1907 Francis Chapman, a member of the faculty since 1902, became Dean and still holds the office. In 1923, Andrew Wright Crawford, Ksq., who had been instructor in the law of Real Property and who was also known throughout the country as an expert in city planning and art matters, resigned because of ill health. He was succeeded by James R. Wilson, Ksq., former Vice-President and Title Officer of the Real Estate Title Insurance Trust Company of Philadelphia, the first title insurance company in the United States. In 1923, Professor S. S. Chapman who had taught the law of Partnership, Corporations and Constitutional Law, died suddenly and the subjects which he had taught were divided and allotted to two new instructors. The present faculty, in addition to the Dean and Assistant Dean. W. 11. Chapman, includes Professors Bedford and Iszard, who have been with the school since 1902; and Professors Wolfe, Boyle, Schofield. Wilson, Hamilton, Woolsey. Boyd, Strong, Rhoads. Scovel, Adam, Snyder, Hunter, Chandler and Comber. When the present Dean assumed charge of the school in 190(5 the total enrollment was in the neighborhood of sixty. At the present time 30

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although the facilities are far from being adequate enough for the present requirements. Beginning with no library for the use of the law school, it was difficult to do good work. To remedy this the Faculty presented the school with a complete set of Pennsylvania State reports, and other books were added from time to time until there is now a good library of nearly 5000 volumes. It was not until 15)13 that the library had grown sufficiently to cause mention in the school catalogs. From its beginning, the school has insisted on thorough work, and it was one of the first, if not actually the first, law schools in the United States to arrange a four-year course of study, and put it in effect at a time when not only in the South, hut in New York, law schools were giving two-year courses and claiming to furnish a complete legal training in that time. The standard of hours of study set by the State Board has never been accepted by the law school as a maximum. Indeed, it has been a minimum so long that it lias even been forgotten by many that there is a provision, requiring of a law school graduate 9G0 hours of classroom work. For many years the Temple School lias exacted from its graduates over 1300 hours of class-room work as a condition of their graduation. During the thirty years of its history, the law school has had in its faculty many well-known members of the Philadelphia Bar. A brief reference to them will be of interest to the Temple student of today. Among the earliest of the teachers in the school was the late R. O. Moon who won both reputation and fortune at the Bar of Philadelphia. Distinguished as an orator, a teacher of elocution at one time. Mr. Moon had a sound knowledge of the Criminal Law, and as a member of Congress in his last years proved himself a learned and valuable member distinguished for his work on the Federal Criminal Code. Henry S. Bornemann as Dean gathered around him as members of the faculty from time to time such men as Henry Rudd, Esq., a very learned lawyer, joint author with Chief Justice Sharswood, of Shars-wood and Rudd's “Cases on Real PropertyWilliam Righter Fisher, a painstaking lawyer of the old school, filled with the best traditions of the profession and desirous of passing them on to the younger men. For many years Mr. Fisher was Deputy Examiner of the State Board of i ar Examiners; T. Elliott Patterson, now Jury Commissioner to the Board of Judges of Philadelphia County; George C. Bowker, a very capable real estate lawyer; Alfred R. Haig, partner of Judge Henry C. Thompson, of the Orphan’s Court, and Samuel P. Rotan, for many years a most efficient and genial District Attorney of Philadelphia County. When, in 1902, the faculty resigned because of a difference of opinion as to the policy of the school, a new faculty was organized with 29

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I here arc over 100 students in the school including the late afternoon classes. During the years the student body has scattered so that today it has representatives in many states of the union. Graduates of the school or former students are to be found in West Virginia, Michigan, New York, Texas, Florida, California, Washington and even in Vancouver, B. C. In the great war, the law school also did its part. One hundred and four students and alumni went into the service of the nation and did their part. Two gold stars on the school service tlag keep in mind Lieutenant Emmanuel B. Wilson and Sergeant Isadore S. Clair, while others who were not called on for the supreme sacrifice saw service of the sternest kind from Belleau Wood to the end of the Argonne fighting and went with the army into Germany. A review of the student list shows so many prominent men now at the bar, and on the bench, that it is difficult to make a selection which does not leave out some worthy of note. 1521 Locust Street 31