PHILADELPHIA, Dec. 1 2004 – LAWFUEL – First with legal, attorney, law news – Incoming Philadelphia Bar Association Chancellor Andrew A. Chirls will make history on Tuesday, December 7 when he addresses his colleagues at the Association’s Annual
Meeting and Luncheon, at noon, in the Ballroom of the Park Hyatt at the
Bellevue, Broad and Locust streets, Philadelphia. Chirls, a partner at Wolf
Block Schorr and Solis-Cohen will be the first openly gay Chancellor to lead
any state or major city bar association when he takes the helm of the 13,000-
member association on January 1.
Born in Newark, New Jersey and educated in public schools, Chirls came to
Philadelphia to attend the University of Pennsylvania. After graduation he
journeyed to the University of California’s Boalt Hall School of Law at
Berkeley. There he met fellow student Larry Frankel and gained a life-partner
along with his law degree. Chirls and Frankel have been together ever since,
celebrating their 25th anniversary just last year.
After law school, Chirls returned to the Philadelphia area to serve as a
law clerk to the Honorable Stanley Brotman, United States District Judge for
the District of New Jersey. In 1982 he joined Philadelphia’s Wolf Block Schorr
and Solis-Cohen as an associate in the litigation department. In 1989 Chirls
became a partner in Wolf Block’s business litigation practice group. Chirls is
today accomplished as both a commercial and a torts trial lawyer.
In 1990 Chirls became the first openly gay member of the Philadelphia
Human Relations Commission. He was instrumental in establishing the
Philadelphia Bar Association’s Committee on the Legal Rights of Gay Men and
Lesbians and he led an effort to get the city’s 25 largest firms to endorse a
model non-discrimination policy that includes gay men and lesbians.
He has also served on the national board of Lambda Legal Defense and
Education Fund for six years.
He successfully tried, for the plaintiff, the first case presented to a
jury in Pennsylvania arising from discrimination based on AIDS or HIV status.
A resident of Center City, Chirls is a world-traveler, avid bird watcher,
jazz aficionado, baseball fan, voracious reader and pianist.
The Philadelphia Bar Association, founded in 1802, is America’s oldest
chartered metropolitan bar association and Pennsylvania’s largest local bar
association.
Web Site: http://www.philabar.org
