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Other University Of Maine Campuses. School Of Law (University Of Maine) Records

 Record Group
Identifier: UA RG 0015-008

Scope and Contents

The records mainly contain textual information created by the University Of Maine School Of Law (also known as the College of Law). The record group contains correspondence of William Walz who was the Dean of the University of Maine's School of Law (1902-1918) on a range of subjects including: meetings with colleagues, staffing issues, class schedules, book acquisitions, bills, Maine Law Review and American Law School Review, various legal cases and articles, judge positions in Maine, presentations, addresses, and lectures, American Bar Association meetings, student enrollment, classes, examinations, and graduations, alumni positions, and various requests for information and catalogs, and legal citations.

Also, includes lists of student’s marks, faculty meeting minutes, details of various books, descriptions of practice court cases used by the College for students, an inventory of College equipment, items for the College’s bulletin board, and information on alumni.

There is also content concerning various attempts to reestablish the School following its suspension in 1920 and the eventual successful reestablishment in 1961.

Dates

  • 1903-1977
  • Majority of material found within 1912-1964

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

Kept at Fogler Library's offsite storage facility. One week's notice required for retrieval

Conditions Governing Use

Information on literary rights available in the Raymond H. Fogler Library Special Collections Department.

Biographical / Historical

The original College of Law (also known as School of Law) began its operations in 1898 and was located in Bangor, Maine in a building at Exchange and State streets. George E. Gardner was the College’s first dean. In 1902, William Emmanuel Walz succeeded Gardner, Walz had come to the University of Maine in 1898 first as an instructor and then from 1899-1902 he was a professor in the College of Law.

The College’s building and records were destroyed during the 1911 Great Fire of Bangor. Following the fire the School relocated to a house at the corner of Second and Union streets in Bangor (now known as the Farrar building). On March 9, 1918 following concerns regarding the financial state of the College and allegations of Walz having pro-German sympathies Walz was asked by the University of Maine’s Board of Trustees to resign as Dean of the College, or if he didn’t resign he would be immediately relieved of all of his duties as both Dean and Professor of Law. On May 10, 1918 the College moved to the University of Maine’s Orono campus. Walz’s later petition to be readmitted as dean and also application for emeritus status were rejected by the Board Of Trustees. Walz would leave Bangor for Germany where in 1933 he died.

In 1920 during World War I, the decision was made to suspend the College of Law because of financial constraints. Thereafter various attempts were made to reestablish the College, but it wasn’t until 1961 that the University of Maine would once again have a School of Law following the merger between the University and Portland University which was approved by the 100th Maine Legislature. Edward S. Godfrey was the first dean of the new school which was based in Portland. Portland University’s school of law had been established in 1927 with the support of former judge Clarence C. Peabody and the Peabody Law Club.

Extent

3 boxes

Language of Materials

English

Arrangement

Physically the Walz correspondence files are generally arranged in alphabetical order by subject or name of correspondent. The other files are arranged by subject and secondary if there are multiple files on the same subject by year of creation. Material still needs to be separated and divided into multiple sub-folders where necessary. Material still needs to be rehoused into archival quality storage.

Box numbers have changed

  1. Old Box #234 (New Box 1)
  2. Old Box #235 (New Box 2)
  3. Old Box #48 (New Box 3)

Accruals

Accruals of the University of Maine's School of Law are not anticipated because the records of the School from the 1961 merger with Portland University onwards are managed by the University of Southern Maine.

Related Materials

There is a Faculty/Staff file on Dean Walz that includes: photographs, correspondence, clippings, and an obituary.

The record group Office Of the President Records, UA RG 0003 includes records on the School of Law and there is a file in Raymond H. Fogler Library (University Of Maine) Records, UA RG 0006.001 on the UMPG Law Library.

Separated Materials

For ease of discovery and access the School of Law faculty meeting minutes (1911-1920) from former Box 280 (now College of Education Box 4) were merged by the processing archivist with the meeting meetings filed in Box 3 Folders 1 & 2.

Processing Information

Processed November, 2017 by Matthew Revitt, Raymond H. Fogler Library Special Collections Department. Processing involved a collection survey and the creation of this finding aid. Material was rehoused into appropriate archival boxes & folders and the boxes and folders numbered and titled added using information from ArchivesSpace.

Title
University Of Maine. School Of Law Records
Status
Completed
Author
Matthew Revitt
Date
November 22, 2017
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
English
Script of description
Code for undetermined script
Language of description note
Finding aid written in English.

Repository Details

Part of the Raymond H. Fogler Library University Archives Repository

Contact:
5729 Raymond H. Fogler Library
University of Maine
Orono ME 04469-5729 United States
207-581-1686