Robert Stone (attorney)

Stone was born in Topeka, Kansas to Jesse and Sarah (Packard) Stone. Jesse Stone was a Baptist clergyman. His parents moved to Kansas from New England where they could trace their lineage to three brothers who had moved to the colonies in 1635. One of the three, Gregory Stone, owned a farm in Boston which became part of the Harvard campus. Stone's father was active in the free state movement.^[2]

On New Years Day 1892, Stone married Lillian A. Frazeur, daughter of Topeka merchant Walter Gillette Frazuer. Together they had one child, a daughter, Lilian, who on January 1, 1916 married Beryl R. Johnson (September 14, 1892— July 29, 1981). Lilian and Beryl Johnson were both graduates of Stone's alma mater, Washburn University. Beryl Johnson would go on to practice law with Stone before becoming a Kansas district court judge.

Stone attended public schools in Topeka before attending Washburn College where he graduated with a bachelor's degree in 1889. In 1885, Stone was the captain of Washburn's first football team.^[3] This team went undefeated for nearly five years.^[4] In 1889, Stone was part of a group of young men who petitioned Phi Delta Theta to form a chapter at the college. Several years later he was an advisor to the Delta Phi Fraternity at Washburn which went on to become the Kansas Beta Chapter of Phi Delta Theta in 1910. Stone was initiated with the Chapter's founding members on October 1, 1910. In 1941, he was honored as the first-ever recipient of the Topeka Phi Delta Theta Alumni Association's "Phi of the Year" award.^[5]

Following his graduation from Washburn in 1889, Stone studied law in the offices of J.G. Slonecker, a future president of the Kansas Bar Association, and then with Frank Foster and John Murray of the firm Murray & Foster in Topeka. He was admitted to practice in 1892.

From 1892 to 1895, Stone practiced in partnership with Ed McKeever in the firm McKeever & Stone. Then from 1895 to 1897 with James Troutman in the firm Troutman & Stone. After leaving the Kansas legislature in 1919, he organized the firm of Stone & McDermott which became Stone, McClure, Webb, Johnson & Oman in 1923.^[6] He remained with the firm until his retirement. Stone was president of the Topeka Bar Association in 1925–26^[7] and was elected to the board of the American Bar Association in the 1936.^[8]

Stone was instrumental in founding the law school at Washburn in 1903. The school's president Norman Plass approached Stone with the idea and put him in charge of the project. In May 1903 Stone assembled a group of local lawyers to begin lecturing without pay. In September of that year the school officially opened in rented space at 118 SW 8th Street in downtown Topeka. At its inception, the law school had four full-time professors and 23 practicing lawyers as lecturers. Stone taught for twelve years at Washburn Law in the areas of Constitutional Law as well as partnerships and insurance.^[9]

Stone specialized in corporation law and insurance and utility cases practicing before state and federal courts, including the United States Supreme Court. Among his more prominent cases was Troutman et al. v. The DeBoissiere Odd Fellows Orphans Home et al. decided by the Kansas Supreme Court in 1903, Doherty v. the Kansas City Star Company in a libel action, and American State Bank v. Walter E. Wilson, Bank Commissioner.

In his later years, Stone was best known for successfully representing the Prairie Band of the Potawatomi Tribe of Indians in a long-running legal action against the United States Government. At the time of his death, Stone had secured more than $1,000,000 for the tribe. The tribe deeply appreciated Stone's tireless efforts on its behalf bestowing on him the name "See-nees" or "Little Stone."^[10]