Jones plaque

HORATIO McCLEAN JONES

COMMEMORATION OF FIRST PRESIDING JUDGE OF THE DISTRICT COURT FOR LYON COUNTY 

November 14, 2013

Accepting the plaque on behalf of Lyon County is Judge Leon A. Aberasturi.

First portion, proposed for delivery by Justice James Hardesty:

The Nevada Judicial Historical Society is commemorating the first Nevada judge to preside over the District Court located in Lyon County. That judge was Supreme Court Associate Justice HORATIO McCLEAN JONES.

The District Court for Lyon County was created by the Nevada Territorial Legislature at its first regular session. The law establishing the Territorial District Court system was adopted on November 29, 1861. This law divided the Territory of Nevada into judicial districts and assigned a judge to preside over each district.

The 9 counties of the Nevada Territory were allocated to one of three judicial districts. Washoe County was placed in the First Judicial District, along with Storey and Lake Counties. The original Second Judicial District was comprised of Ormsby, Douglas and Esmeralda Counties.    Lyon, Churchill and Humboldt Counties formed the Third Judicial District.

The pending civil cases in the Territory were transferred to the various district courts based on the county in which the case originated. The criminal cases, however, received different treatment. For some reason, the law transferred all pending criminal actions to Ormsby County rather than allocating them to the county in which the offense occurred.

The law also required that the terms of the district courts be held at the county seats of the various counties and established the location of each county seat. The county seat for Lyon County was located at Dayton. The county's district court sessions were held in Dayton for about 48 years, until the county seat was officially moved to Yerington in 1911.

One thing that the 1861 Act did not do was to create the office of District Court Judge. Instead, the three justices of the Territorial Supreme Court were assigned to preside in the district courts. The justices had been appointed to the Territorial Supreme Court 6 months earlier on March 27, 1861, by President Lincoln. The  new  Territorial  Law  creating  the  judicial  districts  required  the  justices  to  “ride   the  circuits”  and  sit  in  each  of  the  county  seats  during  the  year.    This  created  a  curious  situation  in   which the trial judges also made up the court of appeals for disputed cases.

Each justice presided over the three county courts in one of the three judicial districts. The Chief Justice, George Turner, was assigned to the Second Judicial District and Associate Justice Horatio Jones to the Third.   Justice Gordon N. Mott was assigned to the First Judicial District.

The Nevada Judicial Historical Society has asked me to present a plaque to Lyon  County commemorating the Honorable HORATIO McCLEAN JONES, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the Nevada Territory, as Nevada's first Presiding Judge of the District Court for Lyon County.

=-==-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

   Second Part:    Proposed for delivery by Peter J. Smith:    

Good morning -  I am Peter Smith,   I am speaking today for the Nevada Judicial Historical Society.                                                                                        

Horatio McClean Jones was the first Nevada territorial judge for Lyon County, but there were Utah Territorial judges before him.  The western part of the Utah Territory was called Carson County but the oldest records in the Lyon County Court start in 1859 in books clearly marked Lyon County.  Unfortunately we do not have the names of the people who served as judges in Lyon County before Justice Jones.

Judge Child was the Utah Territorial Judge sitting in Carson City and Genoa, he or someone appointed by him may have heard cases coming from what is now Lyon County.

        Those earliest Lyon County Court records are here.  They are only the indexes for case files that appear to have been lost.  In 1909 the Dayton courthouse burnt down and perhaps the actual case files were lost at that time.  The county seat was moved to Yerington after this fire and a new courthouse was built in 1911.

In the records of the Territorial Supreme Court we found 8 cases that were appealed from Lyon County.   We found the dates they were filed and case numbers for five of them in these Lyon County indexes, but no other documents from this early period.   In these records we found a variety of familiar names among the litigants, including probates for William Ormsby and Ernie Comstock and adversarial matters involving John Cradlebaugh, John D. Winters, and Mr. Sutro.   One case, Perigrerre v.  Allen was appealed to the Territorial Supreme Court and affirmed.  That may be a distant relative of Justice Ron Parraguirre, depending on which part of the family used what spelling of their name.

It seems unusual today that an appellate court  would hear an appeal from  a case that had been decided by one of the appeals court judges acting as the trial judge for a county court.  The decisions that we were able to find in the Supreme Court records, for cases that were appealed from Lyon County, seem to have been upheld or overturned by the other two justices on the Supreme Court and Justice Jones appears not to have voted on those decisions.  I could not tell if this was a standard practice or just coincidence, we would have to examine all the appeals and sort out which Justices had been the trial court judges on each.

Judge Jones had a secretary, Alfred James, who had previously been the editor of the Territorial Enterprise in Virginia City.  The District Attorney at that time was E.B. Zabriski, the father of the borax miner who operated in Death Valley and for whom Zabriski Point was named.

According to an essay in the Online Nevada Encyclopedia, written by Jeff Kintop, the Nevada State Archivist:

Horatio McLean Jones was  born in Howellsville, Pennsylvania, in 1826.   Jones graduated from Oberlin College where he met his wife America Strong, they graduated in 1849 and Jones graduated from Harvard Law School in 1853. He then practiced law in St. Louis and the Missouri Supreme Court appointed him Court Reporter in 1856.  Missouri was a slave state, but it remained in the Union when the Confederacy was formed in 1861.

In 1861, President Lincoln appointed Jones to be an Associate Justice for the Nevada Territory.  Jones was then assigned to be the Judge for the Third District, which included Lyon, Churchill, and Humboldt Counties.

In 1862, after an unpopular jury decision in the single ledge case which determined the ownership of the Comstock Lode, the territorial legislature tried to switch the districts held by Jones and Justice Gordon Mott. When the bill came back from the Judiciary Committee, the council erupted in heated discussion. Neither Mott nor Jones wanted to exchange districts, though Mott apparently wasn't greatly bothered by the decision since he had been recently elected representative to Congress and would be leaving soon.

The minutes from the Territorial Legislature for December 4, 1862, report Senator Thomas Hannah saying that Justice Mott "was pure, and he was opposed to having the judicial ermine dabbled in filthy pool of politics" .  By contrast "He asserted that  Jones had been lobbying and log rolling with members in a very unjudicial and injudicious manner" and had "dragged his judicial ermine in the filthy pool of politics" .

The minutes continue with counter arguments and statements by Jones' supporters and the report in the newspapers concluded that:

       "such charges are absurd, when you reflect that every member of the Legislature is of the purest             and most unsullied moral character - in fact, all church members and Sons of Temperance, in                 excellent standing!"

Justice Jones accused  Senator Hannah of improperly handling the bill in the Senate, and Hannah challenged Jones to a duel. Jones refused, then said he would not practice the kind of law the attorneys of the First District practiced. Jones walked out of his court and would not hear any more cases during the May term of 1863.

We might base some opinion about Justice Jones from his choice of colleges.  Of all the colleges in the US when he was young, Oberlin was unique.  It had been founded in Ohio by Presbyterians; it was the first college to regularly admit black students, starting in 1835, and it was the first coeducational college, admitting women starting in 1837.  Oberlin college and the town were a major point on the underground railroad for slaves escaping from the south.

1861 to 1863 were the first years of the Civil War.  In March of 1863 the war was not favoring the North, the draft was started, draft riots broke out in New York, and Justice Jones was in the middle of Comstock politics being threatened with a duel over a decision he made on the court.

On July 30, 1863 Justice Jones resigned, tired of the plots and intrigues of the Storey County Bar. He left the bench and went to Austin to practice law.  When the Constitution of the State of Nevada was up for a vote in 1864, Justice Jones gave many speeches supporting it. He practiced law in Austin until 1868. Jones lived for a while in California, and then returned to St. Louis, where he served as a district court judge from 1871 to 1877. Later he went to Vermontville, Michigan, where he died on June 10, 1906.

We are here today to recognize the first Nevada Judge to preside in the Lyon County District Court.  There is little record of his passage here, he handled the cases that were presented to him and he worked under extreme conditions in a new land during the darkest years of our nation's history.

Lyon County's first courthouse was not built until 1864, after Justice Jones had left the bench.  The Court he left was not a building, it was a Court built only on the foundations of the rule of law in an untested and sometimes hostile country.

Nevada calls itself the "Battle Born" state.  This is more than a football cheer.  In 1863 1,000s of troops were dying in battles and from disease, miners in Virginia City were working hundreds of feet below ground in hot, putrid dark tunnels while politicians on the surface threatened to shoot men like Justice Jones for trying to impose some rule of law to their society.

 We thank the men and women of this county and the judiciary that serves them for continuing to uphold these principles now and into the future.

Minutes from September 20, 2013

Minutes of the Annual Meeting

of the

Nevada Judicial Historical Society

Carson City, Nevada

September 20, 2013

The annual meeting of the membership was called to order by Chairman Michael Fondi at 12:20, there being a quorum of the paid membership present.  Present were Secretary Susan Southwick, Treasurer Janette Bloom, Vice-Chairman Jeff Kintop, trustees Patricia Cafferata, Donald Klasic, and Justice Mark Gibbons.  Also present was member Christine Timko, with trustee Jim Smith arriving later.
The minutes of the Annual Meeting of the Membership of September 14, 2012 were approved as mailed. Gibbons/Klasic.

Treasurer Janette Bloom noted that the report dated August 6 represents the status to date, with a balance of $5,815.50, not including any 2014 dues.  The report was approved.
Chairman Fondi presented the “Annual Report” required by the By-laws, noting that most of the content would be covered in the individual project reports to follow.

Susan Southwick reported for both Patricia Cooper-Smith and Peter Smith on the status of the Joint Oral History Project.  Nine pending oral histories were edited by Ms. Cooper-Smith into final format and put on line at the web-site of the University of Nevada, Reno’s Special Collections Library.  Copies were also printed and spiral bound with plastic covers for each of the Project’s participants and for each of the interviewees or their families.

Peter Smith not being present, various members discussed the Lyon County plaque dedication, which is to be held in Yerington on November 14, following oral arguments by the Northern Panel of the Nevada Supreme Court.  The high school will be involved and Peter Smith intends to make a presentation on Justice Horatio McClean Jones, the first Nevada judge for Lyon County, riding circuit as a justice of the Territorial Supreme Court.  Justice Gibbons suggested that since Patricia Cafferata had written an article on the Lyon County Courthouse, she also make a brief presentation on that topic.  Justice Hardesty will introduce the NJHS members present, and local dignitaries and judges will be invited to attend, also.

Jeff Kintop reported that he had been working with Peter Barton of the State Museum to find a source to improve the presentation of the “Ten Cases” exhibit located in the old Supreme Court chambers in the Capitol.  He said that Pacific Studio in Seattle has a system to copy each CD into a digital repeater which would work well, except at present the system cannot handle the 12 CDs in the exhibit.  Since the price is very reasonable, he hopes that they will be able to accommodate the higher number soon.  They might also be able to update the existing exhibit panel.  He will report back at the March, 2014 meeting.

Regarding the justices’ memorials from the Nevada Reports being available on-line, Mr. Kintop noted that the Legislative Counsel Bureau has scanned all of the Nevada Reports including the memorials, but that none of the portraits are included.  He has converted those to a PDF file available through the web-site of Cultural Affairs, but they are not easily found using a browser.  He and Paula Doty of the Supreme Court Library are working to find copies of the Reports that can be easily scanned into digital form which would be searchable.  Janette Bloom suggested contacting the State Printing Office to determine whether they have any of the files available.  When the memorials are available, they will be linked from the State Library and Archives site to the NJHS site at the Supreme Court.
The date for the 2014 annual meeting was set for Friday, September 19.

There being no new business, the annual membership meeting was adjourned at 1:20 p.m.

Minutes of the Annual Meeting 

of the

Board of Trustees of the Nevada Judicial Historical Society

September 20, 2013

Board Chairman Michael Fondi called the meeting to order at 1:25 p.m., there being a quorum present.
The minutes of the annual meeting of September 14, 2012 and the Board meeting of March 15, 2013 were approved as read.

Susan Southwick updated information on the Belmont Courthouse restoration efforts.  She spoke with Chief Justice Pickering, who is very interested in the project, and learned that current efforts are to replace 29 of the windows, with 9 already completed.  The Courthouse Society also is in need of information on the building, especially photographs.  There was some discussion as to where records not already researched might be found, but Jeff Kintop, State Archivist, believes that almost everything known has been covered.  There was general agreement that, at present, the Judicial Historical Society’s limited resources should go to completing projects already underway.  Justice Gibbons said he would act as a liaison with Chief Justice Pickering on the matter.

Susan Southwick reported that Brad Williams, representing one third of the Joint Oral History Project, would like to see that the 12 histories now completed be published in hard-bound format for distribution to libraries in the state.  She said he had contacted Silver State Industries (the Prison printing service) and determined that each history could be printed and bound for about $12.00 apiece.  A quick review of the Nevada Library directory indicates that there are about 61 libraries which could be recipients.  That number does not include the branches of public libraries, nor any school libraries. Many of the special libraries (such as hospitals) would not be interested, so could be dropped from distribution, while large branch public libraries could be added, if desired.

 There is about $16,000 remaining in the grant to print and distribute the existing histories and the remainder should be used to finalize any still in the pipeline.  A list of new candidates for interviews would have to be developed before the project could go forward.  It seemed to be the consensus that the Ad hoc committee (Brad Williams, Peter Smith, Jeff Kintop, Susan Southwick) would continue to iron out the details.  Jeff Kintop noted that Alicia Barber was still in the area and might be available to assist, as well as Patricia Cooper-Smith. UNLV also has an active oral history program and might want to partner with the NJHS and the Ninth Judicial Circuit in future endeavors.

Under new business, Jim Smith put forward a resolution that the Board direct a letter to the State Bar of Nevada requesting that the Nevada Judicial Historical Society be included as a donation “check-off” in the annual dues renewal statement to membership.  Justice Gibbons suggested the donation be $20.00.  This was approved and Mr. Smith said he would provide a draft of the letter.

There being no further business for the Board, the meeting was adjourned at 1:55 p.m.

Respectfully submitted:

=-=-=-   Unsigned Draft  =-=-=-=-, subject to correction and adoption at the next meeting













Susan Southwick, Secretary

Yerington Event, Horatio McClean Jones

You are invited to join the

Northern Panel of the Nevada Supreme Court

in the

Nevada Judicial Historical Society’s

Presentation of a plaque

Commemorating

The Honorable Horatio McClean Jones

First presiding judge

of Lyon Co.

Territory of Nevada

1861-1863

Thursday, Nov. 14, 2013

Following Oral Arguments

(approx.. 10:30 a.m.)

Jeanne Dini Cultural Center

120 N. California Street

Yerington, Nevada

                                                                                                         

Agenda of the Annual Meeting of the Membership

of the

Nevada Judicial Historical Society

September 20, 2013

Sassafras Eclectic Food Joint
318 N. Carson St.
Carson City, Nevada

Noon – 2:00 p.m.

Lunch from the menu, $9-$15.00

I.  Call to Order – Michael Fondi, Chairman

II.  Approval of Minutes of Annual Meeting of September 14, 2012 – Susan Southwick, Secretary

III. Treasurer’s Report – Janette Bloom, Treasurer

IV. Reports:

a. 2013 Annual report – Michael Fondi

b. Joint Oral History Project – Southwick for Patricia Cooper-Smith, editor

c. Justice Horatio M. McClean Jones plaque – Southwick forPeter Smith

d. “Ten Cases” Exhibit upgrades – Jeff Kintop

e. Justices’ memorials on-line – Jeff Kintop

V. Set date for 2014 annual meeting

VI. New Business

VII. Adjournment

Meeting of the Board of Trustees

I. Call to Order – Michael Fondi, Chairman

II. Approve minutes of Annual Board Meeting, September 14, 2012 and Meeting of March 15, 2013 – Susan Southwick, Secretary

III. Discuss donating funds towards restoration of old Nye County Courthouse, Belmont, options – Susan Southwick

IV. Discuss options for publishing and distributing completed oral histories; grant monies available, binding options, printing and mailing costs – Susan Southwick

V. Set date for March, 2014 meeting.

VI. New Business

VII. Adjournment

Nevada Judicial Historical Society

Annual Report

2013

Memberships:   Paid memberships dropped from 10 in 2012 to 9, with 1 paying at an enhanced level, for a dues total of $250.00

Treasury:  Treasurer Janette Bloom reported an August 31 balance of $5,815.50.  This does not include any 2014 dues.

Projects:

Joint Oral History Project:  Patricia Cooper-Smith was hired to work under Alicia Barber of the UNR Oral History Program to edit the outstanding transcripts and to provide introductions to them.  Nine were completed and added to the Program’s oral history data base, which is now maintained by the Special Collections Department of the University Library. Print copies were produced and provided to all participants in the Joint Project, as well as to the narrators or their families. Several remain unpublished, either because no release could be obtained or because the final text was still under review by the narrator. Now on-line are histories for Cameron Batjer, Peter Breen, Proctor Hug, Howard McKibben, Bruce Thompson, Harry Claiborne, Al Gunderson and attorneys Frank Daykin and Herb Jones.  They can be read or downloaded at http://contentdm.library.unr.edu/digital projects. Then click on Oral History Program and use the search boxes available.  Print versions will also be distributed to libraries as funds permit.

Silver Medallions:  No medallions were sold and no “excess” medallions were sold for face value, as the price of silver never reached the threshold of $50/oz.

Books and CDs:   Two books and no CDs were sold in 2013.

Courthouse  Plaques:  A plaque honoring Territorial Justice Horatio M. Jones was prepared for presentation in Lyon County in November, 2013.

Web site and Blog:   The blog can be accessed from a link on the web page or directly at http://nevada-jhs.blogspot.com.  Improvement in design and additional links will be on-going.

Elections:   There were no elections in 2013, as all officers and trustees are in mid-term.

Respectfully submitted:

-=-=-=-=unsigned-=-=--=-
_____________________________________
Michael E. Fondi, Chariman

Next Meeting of the Board will be September 20, 2013, in Carson City.  Details to be posted.

Minutes from March, 2013, unsigned, as follows:

Minutes of the Meeting of the Board of Trustees

of the

Nevada Judicial Historical Society

March 15, 2013
Carson City, Nevada


The meeting was called to order by Chairman Michael Fondi and 12:20 at the Sassafras Restaurant.
Present were trustees Don Klasic, The Honorable Tom Perkins, Peter Smith, Patricia Cafferata, Dennis Myers, Clint Case, The Honorable Mark Gibbons, Jeff Kintop, Jim Smith, Susan Southwick, Secretary and (later) Janette Bloom, Treasurer.  Also present were members Christine Timko and Karen Baggett and guest, Don Southwick.

Patricia Cooper-Smith, on contact as editor/copywriter for the Joint Oral History Project, gave a status report.  She has been copy editing each transcript for inconsistencies and chronology, has done grammar checks and prepared tables of contents for the longer histories.  She has also written a preface for each and prepared a catalog entry for access.  The introductions are mostly completed: Breen, Batjer, Daykin and Herb Jones. Bruce Thompson, McKibben, Claiborne and Reed are almost finished, while Robert Johnston is attempting to obtain a release for Judge Reed’s interview.  There is an interview with Phyllis Atkins which has a release, although Magistrate Atkins was not part of the Joint Project.   Perkins moved and Jim Smith seconded a motion to include the Atkins history if Robert Johnston consents and there are funds remaining.

Cooper-Smith also noted that Alicia Barber, the UNOHP representative, will be leaving on May 20 and that a new oversight organization is needed within the university, since the History Department no longer wants to include oral history.  Prof. Barber has indicated she will contact the director of the Special Collections Dept. to see if they will mentor the remainder of the Joint Project.

Treasurer Janette Bloom reported a current balance of $6,175.50.  Moved to approve (Myers/Cafferata).

Peter Smith reported that Justice Hardesty, now head of the Supreme Court’s Northern Panel, would like to present a plaque for the first judge of either Lyon or Mineral County.  Research indicates that Mineral is very complex, but that Lyon was one of the original territorial counties and a plaque similar to that done for Washoe would be easy to word.  The first judge for Lyon was Justice Horatio Jones in 1861.  Mr. Smith said the plaque would cost $337.00.  Cafferata moved, Klasic seconded a motion to approve the expenditure.

Justice Hardesty will arrange with Lyon County Schools to host the presentation to coincide with oral arguments in Yerington between November 13 and 15.  Details will be added at the annual meeting in September.

Jeff Kintop reported that Governor Sandoval had come across the 10 Cases audio exhibit in the Old Supreme Court Chambers in the Capitol and was concerned that it was non-functional.  Mr. Kintop said that technology has vastly improved since the original exhibit was set up and that he believes it can be updated to last another ten years with an expenditure of about $2,000.  He suggested aiming for Nevada Day, when the 150th Anniversary of the State of Nevada kicks off; Jim Smith suggested maybe a second copy could be included in the travelling exhibit at not much extra cost.  Dennis Myers moved and Peter Smith seconded a motion to approve $2,000 for the renovation of the exhibit.

Under new business, Susan Southwick asked whether there was interest in contributing to the restoration of the Nye County Courthouse in Belmont.  She noted that the State was in the process of deeding the historic building to Nye County and that there was a private organization collecting funds to repair it and make it accessible to the public.  It was generally agreed that this was a worthy project and that Ms. Southwick would explore it further and provide information at the Annual Meeting.

Patricia Cafferata noted she was on the 150th Anniversary Committee.  She said there would be a mobile museum and 150 events offered over the course of the celebration and that the Society should try to be included.

Christine Timko said the Supreme Court is digitizing the memorials for deceased justices that have been published in the Nevada Reports.  She would like them linked to the Society’s web page.  Jeff Kintop said the Archives has the memorials in HTML searchable files, but has no photos accompanying them; he thought they could be scanned from the Nevada Reports.  Janette Bloom said that memorials are current to date.

Jim Smith suggested requesting that the State Bar include a place to make donations to the Society on its membership renewal form.  Judge Fondi said he would broach the subject to Frank Flaherty, who is currently on the Board of Governors.

There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 1:25.


Respectfully submitted:

______________________Draft for approval, unsigned________________________________
Susan Southwick, Secretary

Meeting of the Board of Trustees 

of the

Nevada Judicial Historical Society

Noon – 2:00

Friday, March 15, 2013

Sassafras Restaurant

318 N. Carson St.

Carson City, Nevada

Lunch will be from the menu (not fixed items/price) and in the small front room facing Carson St.; Please  r.s.v.p. to susouth@yahoo.com so the room can be set up to accommodate us.

I. Call to Order – Michael Fondi, Chairman

II. Approval of Minutes of the Board of Trustees, September 14, 2012

III. Treasurer’s Report –Janette Bloom, Treasurer

IV. Report on Joint Oral History Project  - Patricia Cooper-Smith, project editor

V. Report on Lyon/Mineral courthouse plaque ceremony; plaque approval, date – Peter Smith

VI. Report on Updating Ten Cases Exhibit in Capitol; approval of expenditure – Jeff Kintop

VII. New Business

VIII. Adjournment

Minutes of the Annual Meeting of the

Membership and the Board of Trustees

of the

Nevada Judicial Historical Society

September 14, 2012

Carson City, Nevada

Chairman Michael Fondi called the annual meeting to order at 12:25.  Present were trustees Peter Smith, Tom Perkins, Susan Southwick, Janette Bloom, Dennis Myers, Karen Baggett, Patricia Cafferata and Justice Mark Gibbons; Jim Smith arrived later.  Also present were members Christine Timko and Brad Williams, and guest Lynn Bremer.

The minutes of the Annual Meeting of September 16, 2011 were approved as mailed.  (Gibbons/Myers)

Janette Bloom presented the Treasurer’s 3d Quarter Report.  The balance for the period 9/1/11 through 8/31/12 was $5,787.77.  As of 9/14/12, the balance was $5,763.40, excluding dues just received.  The report was approved. (Smith/Gibbons)

Chairman Fondi  then reviewed the Annual Report, which is attached to the minutes.

Susan Southwick reported that trustees Michael Bowers, Michael Fondi,  Jeff Kintop, Don Klasic, Peter Smith, Karen Baggett and herself  were approved for terms ending September 2015.

Brad Williams reported on his part of the Joint Oral History Project, saying he had received tentative approvals for several of the large transcripts; most were being reviewed by the narrators or their representatives before being formalized.  These include Judges Brunetti, Hug, Reed, Atkins and McKibben.  The raw transcripts still need to be edited before being put on-line, and apparently Alicia Barber wasn’t able to do it over the summer as she had planned.  Brad and Alicia will provide a scope of the editing required to Patricia Cooper-Smith by September 27, and Brad will then submit a proposal to the Ad Hoc Committee to consider hiring Ms. Cooper-Smith.

Peter Smith reported on the Society’s web-site and blog.  He corrected the statement in the annual report that Patricia Cafferata’s articles, written for the Stat Bar journal, were actually on the blog.  He has them, but they are in PDF format and he doesn’t know how to add them to the blog.  Karen Baggett and Christine Timko offered to help with the technicalities.  He noted that many hits to the blog came from Eastern Europe.

Under New Business, Justice Gibbons recommended Hawthorne and the 5^th Judicial District and Yerington and the 3d Judicial District as potential sites for new plaques.  Peter Smith said that there were no plaques currently in the pipeline and that he and Jeff Kintop would have to look into the complexities of each to see if they could easily characterized with a “first.”

Jim Smith stated he thought the memorials from the Supreme Court Reports should be on-line and searchable.  Susan Southwick said she thought she recalled that the Archives had the texts on-line, but not in a searchable format.  Justice Gibbons and Christine Timko said they would talk to the Court Clerk about making them searchable.  Ms. Southwick said that West Publishing did not make any of the federal or state memorials available in its on-line publications and that one must do a manual search of the print volumes to find them.

The date for the 2013 Annual Meeting was set for September 20.

There being no further membership business, Chairman Fondi adjourned the Annual Meeting at 1:20.

He then called the Board of Trustees to order.

The corrected minutes of the Board meeting of March 16, 2012 were approved.  (Myers/Gibbons)

The minutes of the June 15, 2012 Board meeting were approved. (Baggett/Smith)

Justice Gibbons moved to re-elect Susan Southwick as Secretary; the motion was seconded by Patricia Cafferata.  Approved.

Susan Southwick added an item to the agenda at the request of Treasurer  Janette Bloom, who had left the meeting.  The Citigroup stock of 49 shares had been split into virtual worthlessness, and Ms Bloom felt it was best to just sell it; she required a letter of authorization from the Board to do so.  Mark Gibbons moved to approve the letter and Patricia Cafferata seconded.  Approved.

The next Board meeting was set for March 15, 2013.

Chairman Fondi adjourned the meeting at 1:25.

Respectfully submitted:

{unsigned}

________________________________________________

Susan Southwick, Secretary