In Mermoriam

Barry Lowe (1951-2006)

     During law school,Barry Lowe participated in a program providing legal services as part of the Cook County Legal Assistance Foundation ("CCLAF"). Before providing legal services to a client, governmental regulations required that the clients go through a financial screening process to determine their "eligibility" to receive services under the program. While working for "CCLAF" Barry realized that many potential clients were being refused services because under the applicable financial guidelines their income level was considered to be too high. During law school, he also worked as a "clerk" in a private law firm. He became aware of the cost of obtaining "consumer" oriented legal services from private lawyers in Cook county and the surrounding area and he knew that most of the potential clients who were being turned away by "CCLAF" due to the governmental financial guidelines could not afford the cost of private legal representation. He learned the philosophy of marketing discounted services to the public while working for my family beginning at seven years of age and he realized that he could utilize the same philosophy to market legal services directly to consumers. The same year that he opened my law practice the United States Supreme Court allowed attorneys to advertise for the first time in history.

     Combining his experience from legal assistance, his family business philosophy and the ability to advertise, in the spring of 1977, he became one of the very first attorneys to advertise in Illinois. During his entire career, spanning four decades, he continuously provided low cost consumer legal services to the public. He was a pioneer in developing set fees for many types of services wherever possible and maintained one of the lowest hourly rates for experienced law firms in the north-east Illinois area. Since he was licensed in October, 1976, he served thousands of clients. His goal was to handle a high volume of low cost matters.

     His law firm continues to operate because Barry felt the segment of the community he served deserves quality legal service at a fair price. The law firm will be transferred to new ownerhip, but run according to his philosphy.

     Barry Lowe was a father, who tried to live his life in the way that G-d would have wanted him to. His response when business was slow was to write "tzedakah" charity checks to Jewish Institutions all over the world. He reasoned that if he gave more, G-d would give him more to help other people with.

      In December of 1997, Barry brough me in to deal with a minor computer issue in his office.  The following week, he called me back again for more work. Now 8 1/2 yeas have passed and I have spent hundreds of hours working with Barry, helping make his law firm work. I trusted me at a critical point in my career and life where I really needed to be trusted.  I didn't just get a customer from this relationship, Barry became a dear friend, whose presence I miss greatly.  He was very supportive when I deciced to move my family to Israel, and we found a way to let me continue supporting his business when he could have brought in someone else. I miss him.

      Barry is survived by his daughter Esther.

      This page will be revised as more information comes to us about Barry's life. Please feel free to use the contact information on the site for this purpose.

       Steven "Shmuel" Protter
        Jerusalem, Israel
        March 27, 2006

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