COLLEGE & LAW

Attending Southwest high school put me on a life-altering course. I discovered that most of my pals were talking about going to college. So, I enrolled in Kansas City Metropolitan Junior College across the street from Westport High School. At that time I had a job at the Bell telephone company at 11th and Oak Street. I worked in archives on the top floor and there was little or nothing to do, so, for the first time in my life I studied. I received very superior grades.

 

The fraternities at the University of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri, began rushing me, because it seems that I was popular at Southwest high school. On the Senior Ballot I was voted: Most Humorous, Biggest Flirt, and Best Personality.

 

I was anxious to go to college in order to pursue girls and party, but I could not afford the cost. The three fraternities that I was interested in were: Kappa Sigma; Sigma Alpha Epsilon and Sigma Chi. I needed to figure out a way to serve meals to defray my room and board. Unfortunately, those positions always went to upperclassman and not pledges.

 

I started with the fraternity I was least interested in, Sigma Chi, and they held a special chapter meeting and agreed that I could serve one meal a day. I then shared this information with Sigma Alpha Epsilon, and they made special arrangements for me to serve two meals a day. I then told Kappa Sigma [the house I really wanted] I could join their fraternity if I could serve three meals a day and not have to pay a House Bill. They held a special chapter meeting and the deal was done.

 

For additional funds I worked at the Italian Village across from Jesse Hall as a waiter, bartender and pizza maker. I also opened the Trolley Car next door at 6 AM and cooked, ran the counter and did the dishes.

 

 

While attending M.U. I owned a 1941 Chevrolet equipped with a roof rack that carried my ladders used in my business of washing windows and taking down trees.

I hired several of my fraternity brothers to work for me.

 

All of these activities, coupled with pursuit of the opposite sex and partying left little energy for attending class or studying.

 

   

 

 

Therefore, I either crammed for tests or found some way of obtaining advance copies of tests and squeaked by.

 

In 1956 I met my true love, Diane, and I got pinned on Thanksgiving Day of that year.

 

In January 1956 I started Law School at the University of Missouri, Columbia Missouri. As part of the 1^st year class orientation meeting we were told by the Dean to look at the man on your left and the man on your right because they will not be there to graduate. Only 1 of 3 graduated. We were told that 1^st year law was a full time endeavor and anyone was found with outside employment would be expelled. Of course I could not attend without my occupations so I continued working.

 

About 1/2 way through that first year I was called into the Deans' office and he told me that it had come to his attention that I was working. I replied, "Who would have told you a thing like that?" To which he responded that certain rumors had come to his attention. I said, "That's the problem with hearsay, you just can't believe it." We sparred back & forth a few more times and he then started laughing and said, "You are going to be some kind of good trial lawyer someday." "I don't want to hear any more about your working outside of your law studies." To which I responded, "I will try to see that you don't."

And I fled his office and of course continued working.

 

I was enrolled in Air Force ROTC and was anxious to go to Korea and fly jets. However, I knew that if I did not finish law school. I would probably never come back to it. Therefore, I applied to the Air Force for an extension of time so that I might obtain my law degree.

 

As fate would have it, Diane became pregnant, and we were married in 1956.

 

 

It was one thing to work my way through law school and support myself, but quite another to support a wife and child in addition. So, I went to the Air Force ROTC Colonel and told him that I no longer desired the extension and wished to move forward into active duty immediately. He was not pleased and told me how difficult it had been for them to obtain the extension I had requested and that it could not be undone. I was not anxious to twiddle my thumbs for a couple of years so I explored the possibility of not accepting my commission.

 

I sought the advice of my Contracts professor, Mr. Pittman (The Fox), and he advised me that until I took the oath and was sworn in, the United States Air Force did not own me.

 

I then advised the Col., that I would not be present for the swearing-in ceremony, and he was furious. He told me that never in the history of the Cadet Corps had anything like this occurred and he told me how much money they had spent on me. I told him that I was sorry.

 

N.B. This might be a good point to share one of the many sayings my grandmother, Laura Welch, shared with me:

"O wad some power the giftie gie us to see oursells as ithers see us."
(O would some power the gift to give us to see ourselves as others see us.) Robert Burns (1759 - 1796)

There seems to be a universal inability for successful self-appraisal. I did not fully appreciate this until after I had spent one month at Lackland Air Force Base courtesy of Air Force R.O.T.C. Shortly after arriving I met the base commanders' daughter, who was a very attractive hottie, so I started seeing her most every night. I was even invited to the Col.'s house for dinner on a few occasions. After returning to Columbia, Missouri I somehow came across my fitness report that had been authored by said Col. His concluding line was, "Cadet Welch is one of the most unusual young men I've ever met. It seems that you either love him or hate his guts."

 

P.S. I can remember in the 1980s having my usual end of the day cocktail with my two best pals, Max Foust and Judge Horn when they jumped on my case and educated me to the fact that not everyone liked me. In fact, they assured me that most lawyers and judges resented my successes and were in fact jealous of me. That most thought that they were much smarter than Lantz Welch and had demonstrated this with better grades in law school. In fact, I was not the darling of the legal profession that I thought I was. My response was then and always: "As my hero, Popeye The Sailorman, always says, ‘I yam what I yam.'"

 

N.B. Another cocktail conversation that I remember with Horn and Foust took place on the subject of the two political parties. As usual I was pontificating about something or other Judge Horn stopped me and said, "Lantzer, I will tell you all you will ever need to know about the Democrats and the Republicans. They both steal. However, there are more Democrats that steal than Republicans. But, even though there are fewer of them, they are smarter than the Democrats and always manage to steal a whole lot more."

 

Anticipating that the next move of the U.S. Air Force would be to get me drafted to serve in the Army in Korea I obtained an affidavit from a doctor that Diane was pregnant and I presented this information to my draft board in Kansas City. I later learned that they did in fact try to have me drafted.

 

I then decided that I would have to finish law school at Kansas City University at their night school. This was a great disappointment, since it was a well known fact that very few of the night school graduates were able to pass the Bar Examinations.

 

I obtained a full-time job as a claims adjuster for State Farm Mutual, obtained a company car and rented a two-car garage made into a house in the Waldo area of Kansas City.

 

I finally graduated from night law school in 1959.

 

To my utter amazement, I did pass the Bar Examinations in 1960 and became a lawyer.