User:Aboudaqn/Walter Beer

Walter Beer (1904-1999) was a 20th-century American lawyer, best known as a co-founder of the law firm Beer, Richards, Lane, Haller & Buttenwieser; he and many of his associated lawyers defended Alger Hiss in criminal, corporate, and personal matters.

Background
Walter Eugene Beer, Jr., was born on November 17, 1904, in New York City, the youngest of three children (two sisters). His parents were Walter Eugene Beer, Sr. (born December 15, 1870), a graduate of Harvard University, and Bella Rosalie Nathan (born June 4, 1895). In 1922, he completed high school at Choate School. In 1926, he received a BA from Harvard University, followed by an LLB from Harvard Law School in 1929.

Career
In 1929, Beer passed the New York Bar and joined the law firm Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett, where he remained until 1941.

In 1941 during World War II, Beer joined the legal staff of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management and War Production Board, where he served until 1944.

In 1945, Beer became one of the founders of Beer, Richards, Lane, Haller & Buttenwieser. Partners included: Stewart W. Richards, Chester T. Lane, Helen Lehman Buttenwieser, H. Kenneth Haller, and Gertrude Schwartz. After Buttenwieser left the firm in 1959, the firm's named changed toBeer, Richards, Haller & O'Niel. The firm dissolved in 1973. ).

In 1974, he worked with Lankenau, Kovner, Bickford & Beer (later Lankenau Kovner & Kurtz, ). In 1975, he became counsel at Bleakley, Platt, Schmidt & Fritz until 1981. In 1976, he was serving as "counsel to the travel program" at the U.S. Department of State. In 1981, he joined Miller, Montgomery, Sogi & Brady. In 1983, he joined Kelley Drye & Warren.

Alger Hiss attorneys
In 1929, Beer graduated from Harvard Law School in the same class as Alger Hiss.

At least three lawyers from Beer's firm helped defend Alger Hiss either during Hiss's two perjury trials in 1949 or after his conviction in January 1950:
 * Harold Rosenwald, associate, was chief architect of the Hiss defense team's argument for a "psychologically disturbed state of Whittaker Chambers."
 * Chester T. Lane, partner, served as defense counsel for Hiss from 1950 to 1953, while Hiss appealed his verdict and later became a source for Meyer Zelig's 1967 book in support of Hiss.
 * Helen Lehman Buttenwieser, partner (1956–1959), was Hiss's personal attorney from 1950 onwards.

In 1959, Hiss hired Beer as "general counsel" for Feathercombs, a company that had employed Hiss, to review contracts and legal issues. Beer found evidence of a patent infringement against a comb made by Feathercombs and recommended that the company file a suit against its manufacturer. Confident of a win, Feathercombs turned down a buyout offer from Gilette. Without an accompanying injunction to halt manufacture and competition, however, Feathercombs lost sales, and Hiss left the company.

In 1970, Beer's name appears as a donor to Mount Sinai Hospital (Manhattan) just before that of Dr. Carl Binger, family friend of Carol Weiss King and in 1949 psychiatric expert during the second trial of Alger Hiss.

Personal and death
Beer's appear in a biography about passengers on the RMS Titanic called A Titanic Love Story. He was a cousin of Margaret G. Arnstein, dean of Yale University's School of Nursing. Before he was ten years old, Beer had grown up in France and spoke and wrote only in French.

In 1930, Beer married Florence Louise Fay; they had two sons.

He was a trustee of Montefiore Hospital in the Bronx and active in Long Island College Hospital.

Beer died age 95 on August 21, 1999, in Brooklyn Heights, Brooklyn, New York.