Asheville Icon Landon Roberts Dies
Article Date: Tuesday, May 01, 2007
Written By: Russell Rawlings
Landon Haynes Roberts, a prominent figure within the North Carolina Bar Association throughout his career who epitomized the “lawyer’s lawyer” for nearly 60 years, died Saturday.
He was 85.
Landon Roberts, left, and Jack Stevens pose for photo at Justice Fund dedication in 2005. |
The Asheville attorney is being remembered as a superb litigator who was devoted to his practice, his firm and lawyers young and old who followed him into what he always considered a most noble profession.
“He enjoyed people, particularly the younger lawyers, and they him,” said NCBA Past-President John S. “Jack” Stevens, whose firm merged with that of Roberts in 1986 to form Roberts & Stevens, P.A. “They would go to lunch together and he would tell stories; he was not exactly a mentor in the law but a mentor in what it meant to be a lawyer and how to be a responsible person.
“He did it with humor, a fine sense of humor that was often directed at himself. That’s the way he was, and he thoroughly loved his firm and his law practice.”
Even in recent years when he was no longer engaged in active practice, Roberts maintained his presence within the firm.
“He never retired from coming to the office,” Stevens added. “In fact, he was in the office two days week before last.”
In addition to his firm, Roberts’ name is also highly recognizable within the walls of the N.C. Bar Center. The office of the executive director of the NCBA was named in honor of Roberts and Stevens by their firm in 1995. And Roberts was honored again in 2005 through the dedication of an NCBA Foundation Justice Fund.
NCBA Executive Director Allan Head, left, describes Justice Fund honoring Landon Roberts, flanked by longtime secretary Doris Oates, center, and his wife of 56 years, Jean. |
“When he received the Justice Fund, his secretary of 59 years, Doris Oates, was in attendance,” Stevens recalled. “And she still comes in one day a week. That is the kind of loyalty he engendered among the people who knew him.”
Roberts served on the NCBA Board of Governors in 1960-63 and was inducted into the General Practice Hall of Fame in 1994.
Highly regarded in legal circles throughout the state, having served on the N.C. Board of Law Examiners from 1981-94, Roberts was especially familiar to the lawyers and citizens of his native western North Carolina. A Marshall native and 1936 graduate of Marshall High School in Madison County, he began his college career there at Mars Hill College.
Roberts later transferred to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he graduated and completed one year of law school prior to the onset of World War II. He enlisted in the Navy in 1942 and entered Midshipman’s School in New York, where he was commissioned as ensign on his 21st birthday.
Roberts served in the Pacific theater throughout the duration, receiving the Appreciation of the President of the U.S., signed by Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal on May 12, 1946.
After four years of service, Roberts went back to UNC and received his law degree in 1948. He then returned to western North Carolina, setting up practice in Asheville where he remained throughout his career. He started with the firm of Smathers and Meekins, where he later became a named partner through various generations of the firm name preceding its merger with Redmond, Stevens, Loftin and Currie in 1986.
In addition to his involvement with the NCBA, Roberts served as president of both the Buncombe County Bar Association and the Asheville Civitan Club, was a permanent member of the Judicial Conference of the Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and a charter member of the N.C. Association of Defense Attorneys.
A memorial service is scheduled for 11 a.m. on Wednesday, May 2, at Trinity Episcopal Church where Roberts served on the vestry. A reception will follow in Tuton Hall. The church is located at 60 Church Street.
A graveside service was held Tuesday, May 1, at Pritchard Cemetery in Marshall.
Survivors include his wife of 56 years, Jean Rankin Roberts.