A newsletter from the William Mitchell Institutional Advancement Office
A Family Legacy Will Help William Mitchell Students by Marie Ruzek ’01, Development Officer
As he approached retirement, Chapman, like many people, began to contemplate his legacy. He looked back on a satisfying career practicing law and forward to a quiet life with his wife. Jack ‘62 and Mary Chapman
W
hile John “Jack” Chapman ’62 attended William Mitchell College of Law at night he worked as a court clerk in the Hennepin County Clerk of District Courts Office during the day at an “unbelievable apprenticeship,” where he saw nearly 250 trials. “That job motivated me to be a trial attorney,”Chapman recalled. He even had time on the job to get some of his law school reading done. It was an ideal situation. After graduating from William Mitchell, Chapman went on to a successful trial practice that spanned more than 40 years. He practiced law at the predecessor firm to
Robins Kaplan Miller & Ciresi, among others, before founding the Minneapolis firm of Arthur, Chapman, Kettering, Smetak & Pikala. As he approached retirement, Chapman, like many people, began to contemplate his legacy. He looked back on a satisfying career practicing law and forward to a quiet life with his wife, Mary, in Minnesota’s north woods lake country. “Trial practice is great–I loved every minute of it,” Chapman said. But he wondered how he would be remembered, and, more important, how would the Chapman family be remembered?
Chapman’s two older brothers and father also graduated from William Mitchell. Jack’s father, Donald Sr., was in the class of 1926, while his brother Donald Jr. was a 1950 graduate and brother Jerome followed not far behind in 1952. Because of the opportunity to attend law school at William Mitchell in the evening and work during the day, each of them was able to pursue a fulfilling legal career. Continued on Page 3
Winter 2009
Building a Legacy