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Yardley Chittick Receives Honorary Degree From Pierce Law

Remarks of the Pierce Law Chairman of the Board Douglas Wood, Esq.

In five months, our honoree, Yardley Chittick, known as "Yard" to his friends, will be 105 years old - Born October 22, 1900.

1900. The same year Ferdinand von Zeppelin launched the rigid air ship and Benjamin Holt invented the tractor. It's the same year the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia renominated William McKinley for a second term and Theodore Roosevelt accepted the nomination for vice-president.

Yard grew up in New Jersey. Probably before the NJ Turnpike or any exits on the Parkway. When New Jersey was legitimately known as the Garden State.

1900. The same year seven US cities agree to form the American Association of Baseball Clubs, which would later become known as the American League. The same year the electric bus made its debut along New York's Fifth Avenue. Bus fare was 5 cents. It's the same year Sigmund Freud published "The Interpretation of Dreams,"

Yard earned a degree from MIT in 1922 in - get this - "engineering administration with a mechanical engineering option". So with that degree, what did he do? He played golf and worked his handicap down to 9. Why work when you can play golf? In 1928 he shot his first hole in one and played his best game - he shot a 74.

Yep, 1900. The same year Henry Ford unveiled the first Detroit-made automobile and the year seven thousand Chicago construction workers went out on strike demanding an 8-hour work day.

In fact, Yard loved the game of golf so much that he turned down a chance to work for Thomas Edison in 1925. And what did he do? He went to work for a company that manufactured golf clubs.

1900. The same year Puerto Rico became a U.S. Territory and Paris unveiled its first subway system. The same year Booker T. Washington's National Negro Business League was formed in Boston, Massachusetts, with the objective of stimulating African American businesses.

Now in 1933, Yard earned an LLB from George Washington University. He passed the Patent Bar in 1934. His first job at the United States Patent Office paid him an annual salary of - guess what - $1,900.

That's right. 1900. The same year Army Surgeon Dr. Walter Reed determined that yellow fever was transmitted by mosquitoes and J.P. Morgan bought Carnegie Steel from Andrew Carnegie for $480 million. The new corporation became United States Steel Corporation.

But Yard didn't move to New Hampshire until 1975, just two years after Franklin Pierce Law Center opened and a year before it awarded its first degree. He needed to be sure that lawyers would be welcomed in New Hampshire. Or at least tolerated.

1900. The same year German physicist Max Planck discovered quantum theory. And the year of the first overseas telephone call - a call made between Key West, Florida and Havana, Cuba, hopefully asking for a good 5 cent cigar.

An outstanding athlete, Yard won the New England Intercollegiate Low Hurdle Championship in 1922, and later raced with the Newark Athletic Club. That's long before steroids pumped up America's athletes.

1900. It's the year the Wright Brothers flew their first glider, "soaring" nearly 200 feet.

And most amazingly, Yard has reached the young age of 104 without popping bills or medication. In 2003, Yard said while attending MIT's reunion, "Most people this age are pill-takers. But think of the money you save if you don't take any."

Yard, we have been honored for years with your attendance at our graduation. You have honored the American patent bar as its oldest member. It's long overdue that we now honor you.

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