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Richard L. Schmalz, Mr. Schmalz was a member of the bar of the Court of Appeals of the Federal Circuit and a member of the bar of the Supreme Court of the United States of America. He received his jurist doctor degree with honors from George Washington University School of Law and belonged to the Maryland and New York State Bar associations. He was Vice President of the Law Department, Asst. Corporate Secretary and Asst. General Counsel, and General Patent Counsel for Westvaco Corporation. His passionate voice of reason, clarity, and fairness guided legal strategies in intellectual property and environmental law for Westvaco for more than 40 years. During his career, “Dick” Schmalz was an active member of the law committee of the American Forest & Paper Association, the trade association of the U.S. wood products industry. Growing up in Dayton, he met in the 7th Grade the love of his life, Kathryn Davis. Together they attended Dayton High School. She was a cheerleader, he was a natural leader and a strong athlete, lettering in four varsity sports. In his senior year, he led the Dayton High Green Devils to an undefeated football season as its quarterback. Upon graduation he served as salutatorian of the Class of 1953. Richard Schmalz attended Centre College in Danville, KY. He was co-captain of the baseball team and became president of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon (SAE) fraternity. Already a champion of equal justice, he was quietly proud that as president of SAE—a fraternity founded in the Antebellum South—he diversified membership in the college’s chapter. He married his 7th Grade sweetheart at the start of his senior year and in 1957 received the A.B. degree in chemical engineering, graduating cum laude. He was selected to play semi-pro baseball with the Cincinnati Reds farm team but, with a young and growing family, he embarked on a different career. Fresh out of college, he worked as a chemist for the U.S. Playing Card Company. As part of his training, he attended The Institute of Paper Chemistry in Appleton, WI where his interest in the paper industry was born. He joined Westvaco in 1960. His career with Westvaco, later called Mead Westvaco, would take him and his family to West Virginia, Maryland, and in 1971, to New York. He was the first patent attorney in the company’s history and developed a powerful team of intellectual property attorneys. A close-knit group even after parting ways, many stayed in contact until his passing. One remembered him as “the best boss we ever had. Dick always went to bat for each of the attorneys that worked for him.” Mr. Schmalz was known by colleagues, outside counsel, and government regulators alike as an attorney of the highest level of professionalism and ethics. His reputation for taking a fact-based position was well established early in his career and would ultimately lead him to successful arguments before the Supreme Court of the United States of America, as well as in international jurisdictions in Germany and Great Britain. Early in his professional life he received a fortune cookie that proved both inspirational and prescient. For decades, he taped that fortune to the desk in his home office to remind himself of it every day. It reads, “Good counsel is a pearl beyond measure.” Mr. Schmalz retired to Arden, NC in 2003 where he attended the First Baptist Church of Asheville and subsequently the First Baptist Church of Hendersonville. He served on the finance committee at each. An amateur pianist—the Flight of the Bumblebee was his most prolific performance—his love of music guided him to the board of Directors of Asheville BRAVO Concerts. He also donated his time and talents to the Advisory Boards of the Salvation Army and the Boys and Girls Club of Buncombe County. He worked on behalf of the homeless and the hungry at Crossroads. His membership in the Freemasons and his status as a Kentucky Colonel are reflective of his commitment to charity and service. He remained close to his high school and college friends in Kentucky, as well as to his friends and colleagues from professional life. He was extremely generous in private and shared his good fortune with many in his life and extended family.