Howard Battle Gist Jr.

Howard Battle Gist Jr.
File:Howard B. Gist, Jr.jpgHoward_B._Gist,_Jr.jpg Howard_B._Gist,_Jr.jpg
Born	(1919-09-17)September 17, 1919 Alexandria, Rapides Parish Louisiana, USA
August 19, 2011(2011-08-19) (aged 91)August 19, 2011(2011-08-19) (aged 91)
Resting place	Greenwood Memorial Park in Pineville, Louisiana
🎓 Alma mater	Bolton High School Washington and Lee University Tulane University Tulane University School of Law
💼 Occupation	Lawyer Alexandria city attorney
🏛️ Political party	Democrat
👩 Spouse(s)	Rosemary Flynn Gist (married 1950–2011, his death)
👶 Children	Howard B. "Trey" Gist III Marcie Elizabeth Gist Stephanie Gist Novakovich Robert Christopher Gist Ellen Kyle Gist Scroggs William McGowan Gist
👴 👵 Parent(s)	Marsolina Eugenia Luckett and Howard B. Gist Sr.

Howard Battle Gist Jr. (September 17, 1919 – August 19, 2011) was, like his father Howard Sr. and his son Howard "Trey" III, an attorney in his native Alexandria, Louisiana. Prior to 1973, he served as the Alexandria city attorney in three mayoral administrations, and like his father, he was a president of the Louisiana Bar Association.

Family background

Gist's father was born on January 15, 1882, in Beebe in White County in north central Arkansas. In 1918, he married the former Marsolina Eugenia Luckett, known as Marcie Eugenie Gist (1881–1947), the daughter of Robert Leven Luckett (1837-1895), a physician and U.S. marshal in Rapides Parish, Louisiana.

The senior Gist attended public schools in White County and what is now Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia in Clark County in south Arkansas. He subsequently worked in a drug store for ten years to save money for law school, attending the legal department at Tulane University in New Orleans, now the Tulane University Law School, from which he graduated in 1911. He then relocated to Alexandria. In 1917, he became a member of the firm of Thornton, Gist & Richey, and later Gist and Methvin. Much of his work dealt with insurance law.

Education and military service

Gist attended public schools in Alexandria and graduated in 1936 from Bolton High School in the Alexandria Garden District. He then attended Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia and graduated from Tulane University with a Bachelor of Arts and then a Juris Doctor from Tulane University School of Law. He was a member of the Kappa Alpha Order. He was also affiliated with Phi Delta Phi.

While still in law school, Gist volunteered for the United States Navy. He obtained a commission through the Naval Communication School at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He reached the rank of lieutenant in the United States Naval Reserve. He was assigned to both the Atlantic and the Pacific Theater of Operations during World War II. He served on the USS Nuthatch (AM-60) and from 1944 to 1945 the USS West Virginia (BB-48). Gist fought in the recapture of the Philippine Islands in 1944, Iwo Jima, and the Leyte Gulf. Near the end of hostilities, he was transferred to the office of the Judge Advocate General in Coronado, near San Diego, California.

Legal career

In 1946, Gist returned to Alexandria to join his father's firm. He had been admitted to the bar three years prior to his military service. For many years, he was a law partner of, among others, DeWitt T. Methvin Jr. Until his death, Gist maintained an active civil law practice in the fields of medical malpractice defense, workers' compensation, product liability law, banking, and municipal law. He served as Alexandria city attorney under the administrations of Carl B. Close, W. George Bowdon Jr., and Ed Karst. One of the Gist-Methvin legal secretaries, Jackie Pope Adams (1922–2013), a native of Marion County, Mississippi, was the secretary to the Alexandria City Council and the city clerk after adoption of the municipal home rule charter in 1977. The John K. Snyder administration appointed three city attorneys in 1973 to succeed Gist: Morris Shapiro (1910–2008), Howard Nathaniel Nugent Jr. (born 1936), and Eugene Paul "Gene" Cicardo Sr. (1933–1996), the selections of Streets and Parks Commissioner Malcolm Hebert, and Finance and Utilities Commissioner Arnold Jack Rosenthal, respectively.

Gist was an attorney, director, and chairman of the board of Security First National Bank in Alexandria for sixteen years, established in 1927, and now part of Regions Bank.

Gist was a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and was instrumental in the formation of the Louisiana Association of Defense Attorneys, of which he later became president. He was also a past president of the Alexandria Bar Association and president of the Louisiana Bar Association from 1977 to 1978, a position previously held by his father from 1946 to 1947. He was listed in the original publication of The Best Lawyers in America. In 1969, he was elected to the Council of Louisiana State Law Institute.

Personal life

Gist was a Roman Catholic and a member of the Knights of Columbus. He served on several boards and was an active hunter and fisherman.

Gist and his wife, the former Rosemary Flynn (born September 1927), had six children: Alexandria attorney Howard Battle "Trey" Gist III, Marcie Elizabeth Gist, Stephanie Gist Novakovich, Robert Christopher Gist, Ellen Kyle Gist Scroggs, and William McGowan Gist. Gist is interred at Greenwood Memorial Park in Pineville, Louisiana.

His son Howard Gist III (born 1951), a 1977 graduate of the Louisiana State University Law Center, still maintains the Gist law office at 4119 Parliament Drive in Alexandria.

References

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