Kenneth F. Hostak Memorial

November 16, 2005

I would like to share a few memories and observations about Ken Hostak with you this morning.

Ken was born and grew up in Kewaunee, Wisconsin in a family with 5 brothers and 2 sisters. His brothers, all of whom were taller and bigger than Ken, played football in high school. Ken was too small for football. But Ken wound up being on the boxing team in high school, fighting in the lowest weight class. I am certain that Ken's early experience in the ring helped bring about that combative spirit that he later brought to service of his clients.

Ken was the shortest boy in his freshman class in high school, and Genevieve Pribyl was the shortest girl. As a result, their classmates immediately began projecting them as boyfriend and girlfriend, although Gen says that they did not begin dating until they were seniors. One of the reasons for the delay was that Ken lived in metropolitan Kewaunee, if there is such a place, and Gen lived on the Pribyl family farm which was beyond suburbia, and Ken did not have access to a car.

Well, the wedding bells eventually rang out for Ken and Gen, and, this past summer, they celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary.

Before their marriage, however, Ken went through a life-changing event. The Korean War was going on, and Ken enlisted in the army. He went through Officer Candidate School and received his commission as a Second Lieutenant. Sent to Korea, he was leading a patrol which was fired upon. Ken received a bullet to the abdomen that lodged near his spine. The report states:

"Although wounded in the initial fire, Lieutenant Hostak directed the reorganization of his dispersed patrol and supervised the evacuation of the wounded. Refusing medical aid, the officer directed mortar fire on the enemy, covering the withdrawal, to the main battle position. Upon reaching safety, the officer from Kewaunee, Wis., refused aid or evacuation until he was assured other wounded members of the patrol received medical attention and had been evacuated."

Because of the location of the bullet, it was never removed. Ken received the Silver Star and the Purple Heart and then went back to battle after recuperating. He was also awarded the Korean Medal of Honor.

Ken was a true war hero, but he never bragged about his wartime experience or expressed an attitude that anyone owed him something for it. One of my first thoughts last Friday was that it just seemed fitting that he died on a day when we honor our military veterans.

When he returned from the war, after having spent two years in a tent in Korea, with none of the comforts of home, Ken told Gen that she might just as well forget about ever going camping. Gen says they also never ate chipped beef on toast.

Having graduated as valedictorian of his high school class, Ken continued to excel academically after returning from service. His studies culminated in receiving his law degree from UW Madison in 1957. He was elected to the Order of the Coif, limited to the top 10% of the graduating class. He was editor in chief of the Wisconsin Law Review. Since 1914, the law school has kept record of the highest average of its graduates. Ken was number one in his class, with a 94.04 average which was the sixth highest graduating average on record.

After graduation, Ken went to work for the firm that became Foley and Lardner and worked with another Milwaukee firm for a time. Then he encountered another life-changing event. He was working on a case involving a roofing contract for the old Piggly Wiggly store in Shorecrest Shopping Center against Ken Greenquist of Racine. He apparently did such a thorough job that Ken Greenquist wanted him on his side in the future. So Ken Greenquist lured Ken and Gen to Racine in August of 1964 to join the legendary firm of LaFrance, Thompson, Greenquist, Evans and Dye. That firm later became Thompson, Evans, Hostak and Clack. In 1975, a merger took place to form the firm of Thompson & Coates, which later became Hostak, Henzl & Bichler, the most unpronounceable and unspellable name imaginable.

I got to know Ken in 1964 when we were both new in town. I was impressed by his intelligence, the clarity of his drafting, and his tenacity in representing his clients. As Tim Pruitt mentioned the other day, Ken had the perfect poker face when negotiating; you had no hint as to where he was heading.

I was even more impressed once the merger of our firms took place in 1975. Ken was the hardest worker I have ever known. His practice was largely municipal law involving a number of towns and sewerage districts along with Racine Unified. The boards of those organizations generally meet at night, because they are made up of people who work in the daytime. Ken would typically work a full day at the office. Then, on three or four nights a week, he would attend a three or four hour meeting of a municipal board. Then he would work all Saturday morning and part of the afternoon trying to organize those things that he had not been able to take care of during the week.

Occasionally, we would see the effect of that schedule. For example, Ken was the president of our firm for many years and presided at our firm meetings. Sometimes, as we all droned on about something inconsequential in typically lawyerly fashion, you could see Ken's eyelids close, his head would drop toward his chest, and he would drift off. Then he would suddenly snap to, and, amazingly, would not really have missed the point of what was being discussed. As the leader of the firm, he continually worked for consensus, and there were very few times that anything actually required taking a vote of the members. I don't recall any disagreements with him that went unresolved in 31 years.

Ken had a great sense of humor and enjoyed a good joke, even at his own expense. He was a very appreciative audience for Alan Clack's stories and had an infectious laugh. One time Steve Smith found a piece of Foley and Lardner stationery and prepared a phony letter to Ken, in the most stern terms, demanding that he return something that he supposedly took with him when he left that firm. After a brief period of uncertainty, Ken realized that he was the butt of the joke and thoroughly enjoyed it. Upon his retirement, Tom Devine put together a "roast" of Ken that had Ken laughing as hard as any of the rest of us.

Very early in the existence of our firm, Ken and I received a challenge from two of our young buck lawyers, Jim Hill and Dennis Barry, who thought they could beat the two of us at tennis. Needless to say, but I must say it anyway, Ken and I emerged victorious, and Ken was really excited that we had beat back the challenge. I was never certain whether it was our superior play or Jim and Dennis were practicing a form of job security. But we never gave them a chance to play us again.

Ken loved the challenge of municipal law. As he stated in a 1975 interview, "I consider municipal government a constantly growing area, and you get a chance to control what happens by stopping a problem before it starts."

Well, what does a municipal lawyer do? Over the years, some of the things Ken was involved in were:

Racine Unified strike in 1977 and the litigation that continued for 2 years afterward;
Disputes with the local newspaper over whether the secret meetings laws were violated;
Annexations;
Contested rezonings;
Restrictions on Vulcan's blasting in the 3 Mile Road quarries;
Caledonia's efforts at achieving status as a village;
Fights on prison locating (Caledonia did not want one, Sturtevant did)
One man's treasure is every one else's junk (Glenn Staege case)
Meetings and more meetings

But the crowning achievement in his legal career actually occurred after he had officially retired. (Retirement for Ken initially, by the way, meant that he wore a sport shirt, came in at 8 and left at 5.) At his retirement, negotiations were under way among the City of Racine, Mt. Pleasant, Caledonia, and Elmwood Park regarding the extension of municipal sewer service to I-94. The lack of sewer at the I had prevented development of the I-94 corridor in Racine County. Dennis Kornwolf was the Chairman of the Town of Caledonia at the time, and he, and later Susan Greenfield, practically insisted that Ken stay on as special counsel for the negotiations. The negotiations dragged on, and we were telling Ken that it looked as though he had a lifetime engagement and would never be able to retire. Finally, an agreement was reached. I am certain that Ken's presence was essential to bringing the parties together and then drafting something they all understood and that would be understood 30 years into the future.

When Ken did finally retire, he basically went cold turkey, which is probably the only way he could retire. He still kept an office at our firm and was available to consult on municipal matters, and visited the office on occasion, usually to use our copying machine. Ken had been totally opposed to having a microwave oven at our offices. After he retired, we got bold enough to bring one in. Since his office was rarely used, we put the microwave in that office. I really don't think the microwave in his office kept him away. I think he was just having too good a time traveling, playing golf, continuing to learn, and enjoying his family.

We miss Ken at the office in a number of ways and not only for his legal expertise. Most lawyers become lawyers because we are too inept to do anything else. Ken was our "Mr. Fixit". It was not unusual to see him take apart some piece of office equipment and get it to work right. Last Saturday, I was in a real hurry to get somewhere and stuffed too many pages into the shredder and jammed it. I simply could not get it to work. If Ken had been there, I have no doubt he would have solved the problem in no time at all.

Ken was devoted to Gen and his daughters and their families. Where they were concerned, the poker face dissolved, and he was a real marshmallow and very protective. When the teacher's strike occurred, Ken was representing Racine Unified. He was very concerned about the possible loss of a year of his daughters' education. Ken enrolled them at Prairie School. That action made the front page of the paper, and Ken took a ton of flak. But that was all right; he was protecting his daughters. When young men were calling on his daughters, he adopted a different form of protection. He dropped his voice a couple of octaves, spoke very somberly, and must have scared the daylights out of them.

Karen told me about the time that she had her first date with a young man. After dropping her off, the poor soul managed to back into the ditch in front of the house. They proceeded to get Ken out of bed, and Ken got out a 2 by 4 which he placed under the wheel and helped extricate the unfortunate young fellow. The next morning Ken muttered that the kid seemed to be a loser, and Karen never dated him again.

Diane told about the time that she was having a Halloween party when she was in high school. Ken was not exactly thrilled about being a chaperone to these kids. What they did was put a dress on Ken, with an amply stuffed bra, and a wig, and he just sat in front of the TV through the whole party. He was so convincing that all of the kids at the party thought that he was Diane's grandmother.

Mary remembers the time that the whole family was visiting San Francisco when she was about 4 or 5, and she was afraid to go into the wax museum. She and Ken waited for the others at Fisherman's Wharf, and he bought her a shrimp cocktail (which she thoroughly enjoyed and refused to share with him), and he never tried to coax her to go into the museum. Mary said that was typical of how Ken would respond to her concerns and those of her sisters.

Ken's drive and his enthusiasm about education certainly carried through to the next generation of achievers. Karen works as a controller at Ford and lives in Birmingham, Michigan with her husband, Joe and their children, Joe, Jr. and Anne. Diane is a pharmacist and lives in Racine with her husband, John and their children, David and Katherine. Mary is a patent attorney and lives in Chapel Hill, North Carolina with her husband, Genichi and their children, Taiyo and Seiji. Ken was extremely proud of his daughters and their families.

Ken was a brilliant lawyer, an acknowledged giant in the field of municipal law. When Racine County was considering hiring counsel for a project (and actually hired someone else), Supervisor David Retzinger observed, "The thing you want to do is win the case. I find Ken Hostak to be a real tough guy. That guy's out to win."

Beyond the competence in the law was a solid human being. As Dennis Kornwolf said at the time of Ken's retirement, "He's a man with probably the highest degree of integrity I've ever met. And I don't throw those comments out loosely."

That's the Ken Hostak we all know and will always remember. A devoted husband, father, and grandfather, an outstanding professional, a man of the highest ethical standards, and a friend.