Marshall law firm marks centennial
By JOHN HENDLER
Editor-in-Chief
The story of the oldest law
firm in Marshall actually
began in southern Illinois.
Lewis W. Schroeder or
“L.W.” was the founder of
what is known today as
Schroeder DeGraw PLLC
located at 203 East Michigan
Ave. in downtown Marshall.
“L.W. graduated from
high school in southern
Illinois and worked as a
farmer there,” said longtime
partner Ron DeGraw, who
joined the firm in 1959.
“Farm work was dying out,
so he decided he might want
to go to college, so he rode
the rods under a freight train
to Ann Arbor. One of the
people he met in Ann Arbor
was Jim Mackey, who was a
Marshall boy. Mackey said
he was going to law school
and L.W. said he was plan-
ning to be a dentist or a doc-
tor but Mackey talked him in
to being a lawyer. So, he
went over to the law school,
no undergrad, applied and
was admitted on the spot.
When he graduated, he went
to Cassopolis but did not do
well there, and Mackey kept
in touch with him and told
him that Marshall could use
another lawyer. So, L.W. and
his wife came here and start-
ed the firm in 1921.”
DeGraw said over the
years in the office they have
found many of L.W.’s notes
including how L.W. and his
wife would split an egg for
lunch and also how busy
L.W. was one day when he
drew a deed and got 50 cents.
“Life was different then,”
said DeGraw with a smile.
“David (Ron’s son and
another attorney at the firm)
and I once concluded that we
still wished it was that way.”
Over the years, starting
with L.W., said DeGraw,
there have been 16 attorneys
who worked at the firm.
Six left for various rea-
sons, with Jason Bomia
being the most recent after
he became a Calhoun County
Judge.
Working alongside
DeGraw at the firm is his son
David, who joined in 1985;
Lisa McNiff, who joined in
1995; Brock Veenhuis, who
joined in 2015 and Katy
Reed, who joined the firm in
June.
All the attorneys say their
workloads have increased in
the past few months as the
court system starts to get up
and running again in the
midst of the COVID-19 pan-
demic.
But they acknowledge that
some of the changes brought
about by the pandemic will
continue on.
“They found a way to still
conduct everything remotely
which was kind of neat,” said
Veenhuis, who admitted that
being back in the courtroom
has taken some getting used
to.
Reed said that even though
some proceedings are back
in person, many family court
matters are still online.
“It’s a whole new world
now,” said Reed. “This was
part of the tech plans in some
ways. I remember hearing
Michigan Supreme Court
Chief Justice Bridget Mary
McCormack say this only hit
‘fast-forward on the inevita-
ble.’”
Reed, from Lansing went
to Western MichiganUniversity’s Cooley Law
School.
Veenhuis went to law
school at Michigan State and
is from Swartz Creek.
David DeGraw went to
Hamlin University Law
School in St. Paul. Minn.
McNiff grew up in Ft.
Wayne and went to law
school at Wayne State.
Ron DeGraw, who came
to the firm in May 1959,
went to law school at the
University of Michigan.
Reed, who had worked in
Lansing and Battle Creek
said she “loves” working in a
small town.
“It’s so nice to know
everybody and see familiar
faces,” she said.
Sometimes knowing many
people in a small town can
have its drawbacks, as Ron
can attest, sharing the fol-
lowing story.
“One time I was on the
street and a client stopped
me and I tried to explain to
him why his work wasn’t
done, and all of a sudden I
felt this sharp pain in my
backside, and I turned around
and the Postmistress of
Burlington had hit me with
her cane, and she said to me:
‘If you weren’t out here gab-
bing, you’d have my workdone,’” said Ron. “That’s
what life is like in a small
town. In the big city, you
never see your clients, or
very seldom. It’s a lot more
personal contact here and it
makes it very difficult to bill
because you see these people
and you know their circum-
stances. That’s the hardest
part of practicing law in my
opinion.”
Ron said practicing law
has become more of a chal-
lenge these days because of
people’s expectations.
“The biggest change is
instant gratification,” he
said. “It used to be that some-
body would come in and
you’d write a letter and tell
them that you’d probably
have a response in 30 days.
Now, they call you and say,
‘I emailed you yesterday and
you didn’t reply. Why not?’
Everything has to be done
immediately and you get red-
line copies of 30-page con-
tracts and they expect a
response tomorrow...
Everything’s got to be done
yesterday.”
That change in expecta-
tions began a quarter century
ago as the internet took hold.
Today, the hundreds of
law books in the firm’s con-
ference room sit untouched.
Years ago, it was the norm to
see attorneys pore over
numerous books spread out
on the conference table.
“I always felt I may not be
the smartest person, but
nobody was going to out-
work me,” said Ron, who
took pride in his research
efforts. “I’ve always put in a
lot of hours.”
David noted that “there
was an art to doing research
with the books,”
“This room is full of
books, and they used to be
used,” he said. “And the
table would be covered with
open books. I’d rather use
the books.”
Title opinions on abstracts-
where the title company
issues a title commitment, is
also a thing of the past.
“The lawyers used to be
involved in it with an
abstract, a summary of title
history to your property,”
said David. “You’d have it
updated by the abstract com-
pany, take it to an attorney
and the attorney would issue
an opinion on whether theproperty was marketable or
not...I can remember walk-
ing into my dad’s office and
there would be a stack of
abstracts on the floor 3 feet
high and he’d have to do title
opinions on them. We don’t
do that anymore because
there are no more abstracts.
That was a huge change in
real estate law.”
McNiff shared David’s
sentiment about how the
internet changed how law is
practiced.
“When I got here, I didn’t
have a computer; I don’t
believe any of the lawyers
had a computer at that point,”
she said. “I had been using a
computer in law school and
when I got here, I remember
thinking, ‘I really need a
computer.’”
Another big change she
noted over when she first
came to the firm was the role
women play when it comes
to the law.
“When I first came here,
there were all male judges,”
said McNiff. “And now, out
of nine judges (in the coun-
ty), four are women. We’ve
seen a larger increase in the
number of women practicing
law as well and I believe that
has changed the tenor of the
courtroom quite a bit.”
McNiff said she always
wanted to be a lawyer.
“I can’t remember not
wanting to be a lawyer,” she
said. “And president. I fig-
ured I’d be a better president
if I were a lawyer.”
Reed had been a journalist
for a decade and then decid-
ed to go in a different direc-
tion following the 2008
recession.
“I thought, ‘what am I
going to do now?’” saidReed. “Everybody said I’m
good at arguing, so that was
when I decided to fully
immerse myself in law.”
Vennhuis said growing up,
he always enjoyed reading
and writing.
“That’s our stock and trade
as attorneys,” he said. “I
remember when I inter-
viewed here, and this is the
truth....my dad, when I first
started college , was starting
his own business and I never
really knew lawyers could be
or were involved in a process
like that. It was neat to see
how they could help them
through that process and so, I
thought I could make a career
of doing that for other peo-
ple.”
David bluntly admitted: “I
did not want to be a lawyer.
It looked like way too much
work.”
Growing up, David saw first-
hand how busy his father
was.
“People calling late at
night, weekends getting
chewed up,” he said. “We’d
start a board game after din-
ner with family and friends,
the phone would ring, and
we’d have to deal him out.”
David said that in his
senior year of college, he
started to wonder what he
was going to do with a degree
in economics.
“I didn’t want to work for
somebody else like a corpo-
ration or teach, so I figured I
better go to law school,” he
said.
Ron said his desire to
become a lawyer happened
when he was 4 years old.
“I lived in St. Joe, Mich.
and we were under the influ-Lewis W. Schroeder, left, met Marshall’s Jim Mackey in Ann Arbor. Mackey eventu-
ally persuaded him to move to Marshall to practice law in 1921.In May, Ron DeGraw marked 62 years since he came
to Marshall and joined the firm.Continued next page