Harris is gone.
I worked with him for close to 40 years: hour by hour, I think I spent more time in his company than that of anyone else in my life.
Harris Zimmerman, respected Bay Area attorney and mediator, died on May 20, 2009, at Summit Hospital in Oakland, California, of complications from idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. He was 89.
Mr. Zimmerman was born on November 29, 1919, in Omaha, Nebraska. When he was two, the family moved to Chicago. Mr. Zimmerman graduated from Austin High School in 1936. He attended Illinois Institute of Technology, earning a B.S. in Civil Engineering while working part-time on Chicago subway and highway construction. He and two friends spent one summer surveying, in aid of which they pooled their money and, for $50.00, bought a Model T Ford which served them well, especially as they were soon capable of taking it to pieces and putting it together again, even after driving it into a lake.
He fell in love with flying at an early age and soon earned a pilot’s license. The love of flying led him, after his 1941 graduation from IIT, to work for Boeing Aircraft Company in Seattle, Washington, where he found that designing structural members for B-29s and B-17s did not satisfy his desire to fly. While in Seattle he married Laura Hexter, and was still an employee of Boeing when Pearl Harbor was bombed. Harris tried to enlist, but both the Army and Navy would not take him because his work was deemed too important to the war effort. The Marines had no such quibbles and in 1943 he joined the Corps, despite his slight stature. His drill instructor, a man of monumental temper but careful vocabulary, called him a “a blasted little feather merchant,” a sobriquet that he remembered with glee throughout his life. He enlisted as a private and, after Officers Training School at Quantico and numerous engineering and flight training courses, he procured a naval aviator qualification: the blasted little feather merchant flew dive bombers and torpedo bombers. He was honorably discharged as a Captain in 1945.
In 1946 he and Laura moved to the Bay Area, where he worked as a Mechanical Design Engineer. From 1947 through 1951 he attended Golden Gate University, while working days in Oakland for a patent attorney. He registered to practice before the U.S. Patent Office in 1948, passed the California Bar in 1951, and was licensed to practice in state and federal courts and before the U.S. Supreme Court. He prosecuted thousands of patent and trademark cases, served as trial counsel and expert witness both for litigants and for the Courts, was appointed Special Master for federal cases, and served as a private mediator as well as on Neutral Evaluation Panels and Mediation/Arbitration panels for the U.S. District Court.
He was a man of great patience and wisdom, slow to take offense and careful in his conclusions. Perhaps above all, he was a teacher, bringing his experience and the clarity of his thinking to everything from the conduct of the Passover Seder to lecturing on intellectual property law before magistrate judges, for legal continuing education seminars, the U.S. District Court Federal Practice Program, and classes at the Haas School of Business at U.C. Berkeley.
His sense of humor was warm, and wide, and at times tremendously silly; his friendships were strong and enduring, and his commitment to family and community unfailing. His interests included Democratic politics and the arts; Judaism and archaeology; the sciences and world affairs, and anything else that caught his intelligent attention. He was a tennis player and an avid golfer for as long as he could hold a club.
He is preceded in death by his beloved son-in-law Orhan Tozun, and leaves behind his wife Laura, daughters Diane Tozun and Bess Zimmerman and son Andrew Zimmerman, and his grandson Ned Tozun and Ned’s wife Dorcas. He also leaves behind a close, extended family and the many friends and colleagues who benefited from his generosity of spirit and unselfishly shared wisdom, from his serene world-view and his bone-deep determination to find, and do, the right thing.
He was of the Greatest Generation and embodied its virtues of loyalty, level-headedness, and humility. That spirit will stay with us, but his presence is, and always will be, sorely missed.
Harris Zimmerman, respected Bay Area attorney and mediator, died on May 20, 2009, at Summit Hospital in Oakland, California, of complications from idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. He was 89.
Mr. Zimmerman was born on November 29, 1919, in Omaha, Nebraska. When he was two, the family moved to Chicago. Mr. Zimmerman graduated from Austin High School in 1936. He attended Illinois Institute of Technology, earning a B.S. in Civil Engineering while working part-time on Chicago subway and highway construction. He and two friends spent one summer surveying, in aid of which they pooled their money and, for $50.00, bought a Model T Ford which served them well, especially as they were soon capable of taking it to pieces and putting it together again, even after driving it into a lake.
He fell in love with flying at an early age and soon earned a pilot’s license. The love of flying led him, after his 1941 graduation from IIT, to work for Boeing Aircraft Company in Seattle, Washington, where he found that designing structural members for B-29s and B-17s did not satisfy his desire to fly. While in Seattle he married Laura Hexter, and was still an employee of Boeing when Pearl Harbor was bombed. Harris tried to enlist, but both the Army and Navy would not take him because his work was deemed too important to the war effort. The Marines had no such quibbles and in 1943 he joined the Corps, despite his slight stature. His drill instructor, a man of monumental temper but careful vocabulary, called him a “a blasted little feather merchant,” a sobriquet that he remembered with glee throughout his life. He enlisted as a private and, after Officers Training School at Quantico and numerous engineering and flight training courses, he procured a naval aviator qualification: the blasted little feather merchant flew dive bombers and torpedo bombers. He was honorably discharged as a Captain in 1945.
In 1946 he and Laura moved to the Bay Area, where he worked as a Mechanical Design Engineer. From 1947 through 1951 he attended Golden Gate University, while working days in Oakland for a patent attorney. He registered to practice before the U.S. Patent Office in 1948, passed the California Bar in 1951, and was licensed to practice in state and federal courts and before the U.S. Supreme Court. He prosecuted thousands of patent and trademark cases, served as trial counsel and expert witness both for litigants and for the Courts, was appointed Special Master for federal cases, and served as a private mediator as well as on Neutral Evaluation Panels and Mediation/Arbitration panels for the U.S. District Court.
He was a man of great patience and wisdom, slow to take offense and careful in his conclusions. Perhaps above all, he was a teacher, bringing his experience and the clarity of his thinking to everything from the conduct of the Passover Seder to lecturing on intellectual property law before magistrate judges, for legal continuing education seminars, the U.S. District Court Federal Practice Program, and classes at the Haas School of Business at U.C. Berkeley.
His sense of humor was warm, and wide, and at times tremendously silly; his friendships were strong and enduring, and his commitment to family and community unfailing. His interests included Democratic politics and the arts; Judaism and archaeology; the sciences and world affairs, and anything else that caught his intelligent attention. He was a tennis player and an avid golfer for as long as he could hold a club.
He is preceded in death by his beloved son-in-law Orhan Tozun, and leaves behind his wife Laura, daughters Diane Tozun and Bess Zimmerman and son Andrew Zimmerman, and his grandson Ned Tozun and Ned’s wife Dorcas. He also leaves behind a close, extended family and the many friends and colleagues who benefited from his generosity of spirit and unselfishly shared wisdom, from his serene world-view and his bone-deep determination to find, and do, the right thing.
He was of the Greatest Generation and embodied its virtues of loyalty, level-headedness, and humility. That spirit will stay with us, but his presence is, and always will be, sorely missed.