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WYOMISSING, PA (January 13,2008)-- To understand my father as a lawyer, it is necessary to have some background on his pre-law life. My father graduated from Reading High School in 1934. He was 5’5” and weighed only 115 pounds. Looking at his senior class picture, you would have thought that he had just graduated from junior high instead of high school. He never participated in any sports at Reading High. Nevertheless, upon entering the University of Michigan in the fall of 1934, he joined Theta Chi Fraternity, an apparent “jock house” and, for reasons unknown, promptly decided to go out for the Michigan wrestling team. Michigan was a national powerhouse in wrestling. Its coach, Cliff Keen may have been amused by my father’s decision to try out, but the amusement only lasted a few moments. After taking a look at my father, Keen told him to come back when he grows up. Despite the lack of interest by the coach, my father made the freshmen team and learned to wrestle. In his sophomore year he started for Michigan at 118 pounds and finished 8-3 in the Big Ten. Notwithstanding that incredible accomplishment, the story does not end there. In his junior year, my father finished third in the Big Ten, and went on, through a huge upset in the finals, to win the National Championship. In his senior year, he was undefeated in the Big Ten and repeated as National Champion. At his retirement celebration in 1970, Coach Keen called John S. Speicher the most remarkable athlete he had ever known.

My father went on to law school at the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 1941. Upon graduation, he began private practice with his father, John W. Speicher and C. Wilson Austin, which did not last long, as he was soon off to enlist in the United States Navy. As an Ensign, he was dispatched to Italy on the USS Rowan. The ship sunk off the coast of Sicily in 1942, trapping my father below deck. He managed to swim out of the sunken ship, but suffered hand and body shrapnel wounds. He was subsequently transferred to the Pacific as a Lt. Commander. While serving his tour of duty in the Pacific, my father roomed with a humorless officer who seemed to delight in being unnecessarily harsh with his men. During a storm, a picture frame owned by his roommate fell over and broke on the floor revealing a very personal picture of his wife in a state of undress. My father promptly shared the photo with the enlisted men. My father’s Pacific ship shared a similar fate as the USS Rowan, as prior to the War’s end a kamikaze plane crashed into it. Although the ship did not sink, it was badly damaged and had to be towed back to Pearl Harbor. His roommate, by the way, did not survive the attack.

In 1946, with the War over, he returned to Reading to once again begin his practice with Speicher and Austin. Four years later, his brief stint at the practice of law was again interrupted as he was called back to military duty in the Korean War. Growing weary of the Navy, my father decided that if my mother were to become pregnant for the third time, he might be able to enlist the help of Congressman George Rhodes and be discharged from further service. His plan worked. My mother became pregnant. George Rhodes intervened and got my father discharged from the Navy, and I was born shortly thereafter. In a strange way, I owe my existence to the North Koreans and Communist Chinese.

Although my father was a general practitioner, his love was in trial work. As a young boy, I attended night hearings at justices of the peace. Often I would be removed from the room to avoid hearing foul language and tales of violence. Often, I would be dispatched to the front porch where I continued to hear the entire testimony through an open window. I could never understand why there were more lawyers in Reading than my father, as it was unconceivable that anyone would want to go to someone other than my father for legal help.

As a lawyer, my father was compassionate, irreverent and aggressive. Our dinners at home were almost always interrupted by his poor and sometimes pathetic clients who had no one else in the world to help them, but my father. He would frequently visit these lost souls, making sure that they had food and were taken care of. That side of him, his compassion for such people, still moves me to tears more than thirty six years after his death. He was not alone in this behavior, as so many lawyers in his generation performed untold acts of kindness on a regular basis.

In the courtroom my father was known to unexpectedly make jokes that are still the topic of discussion amongst many of the more senior members of the Bar. Once at the call of the civil trial list, the judge asked my father how he could possibly be ready to try so many cases at one time. My father responded that all of his cases were “Chinese ships with square sails”. For those not getting the joke such ships are “Chinese junks”. He once urged his grossly overweight female client to show the court the bruises inflicted on her by her husband. To the horror of those in the courtroom, she did, lifting her dress up to her waist, partly exposing herself in the process. I’ve even been told that once he represented a man charged with having sex with a cow. According to the story, my father subpoenaed neighboring farmers to testify. When Judge Hess asked why the farmers were being subpoenaed, my father, with a straight face, answered: “because the cow’s chastity is in issue”.

Perhaps the strangest client he ever had was Bobby, the Airdale, who, in the late 1950’s, was the world’s richest dog. Bobby’s owner had left her entire estate in trust for Bobby. My father was the trustee. Bobby lived in a nice Reading row house with a caretaker who was given free board in exchange for caring for Bobby. Somehow, Bobby’s wealth came to the attention of CBS and Bobby was asked to be on the quiz show, “I’ve Got A Secret”. My father was to be on the show with Bobby until he learned that the producers wanted Bobby to sit on my father’s lap while the panel asked him questions. My father made the caretaker have the honor of holding Bobby, who weighed at least 60-70 pounds, saying: “They’re not making an ass of me on national TV.” Ultimately Bobby died of cancer at the ripe old age of 14, and the trust was distributed to the family of his former owner.

Although my father had fun with such cases, his love of federal civil litigation is what I remember best. He relished going against the hot shots in Philadelphia and, of course, beating them. A few years ago a senior Philadelphia attorney told me that my father had his trial group convinced that he was a “local yocal”. Prior to trial they would see him looking up at the tall skyscrapers in Philadelphia, seemingly in awe of the “Big City”. After losing to him, they quickly realized he had simply played upon their arrogance and outwitted them. Whether in a wrestling match or in the courtroom, my father loved being the underdog and beating his surprised opponent who foolishly underestimated him.

More than being a husband and a father, John S. Speicher was a lawyer. He loved his work and loved interacting with his fellow attorneys. The Berks County lawyers who fought in World War II seemed to have a special bond with one another that never wavered. They fought hard, lived hard, and partied even harder. Wives and children mattered, but there was a wild side to them that probably came from the War and never let them completely settle down.

At the age of 53 as he was attending Coach Keen’s retirement celebration at Michigan my father became ill with what was shortly thereafter diagnosed as terminal adrenal cancer. Within six months he was gone. Even at the end of his life, as cancer ravished his body, he would sneak out of the Reading Hospital and go to lunch at the Wyomissing Club, or meet fellow attorneys at the West Reading Hotel for a drink. He continued to seek out just one more good time or to make just one last joke. There are only a few attorneys left who fought in World War II. No matter what the practice of law is or might become, it will never have the humor, passion and compassion that it had with lawyers like my father and those of his generation.

Media Contacts:

Mervin A. Heller, Jr., Esquire
Leisawitz Heller
(610) 372-3500