Janet Monson
Aafedt, Forde, Gray, Monson & Hager, P.A. extends its congratulations to Jan Monson! She is retiring on July 19, 2024, and is fired up about it!
Jan interviewed for a law clerk position in April of 1980. She was nearly done with her second year at the University of Minnesota Law School. She has vivid memories of her interview, even the white patent leather loafers that one partner sported.
She was offered the job and began work in June of 1980. She mostly wrote appellate briefs for Curt Gilmore and the other partners, as the standard of review was different back then: adverse decisions were often appealed. Files were stacked up like planes on a tarmac, one after another.
She likes to think she was offered an associate position because of her writing skills, but more than one partner told her she was hired because she somehow found a way to board Warren Eustis’ vintage yacht as it sailed down the Mississippi river with the whole firm reveling and a party in full swing! Memory: Curt Gilmore decorating a chocolate cake with yellow icing. The firm parties were epic in the 80’s.
After passing the bar in 1981, she joined the firm as the first woman associate. There were about a dozen men at the time. She continued to write briefs, but soon began to take depositions and then hearings.
Mike Forde asked her to handle a hearing for him – it was her first. He told her the case was a “loser, but it would be a good learning experience.” Memory: She walked into the courtroom and a crusty old judge immediately questioned who she was and what she was doing there. He then launched into a loud rant about babe attorneys who weren’t tough enough. A verbatim quote: “A monkey could do probate, but it takes a man to do trial work.”
When she returned to the office, the guys all gave her a pep talk. The judge’s speech was even transcribed onto a calligraphy scroll as a memento to cherish! She did, in fact, lose the case, but the judge later called her and told her “She wasn’t that bad”.
For the next forty plus years, she practiced workers’ compensation defense. Her case load gradually transitioned from random assignments by Curt, to insurance referrals, to loyal self-insureds and employers with the ability to designate defense. Memory: At a claim review in April of 2024, the company president asked her if she could just stay on and do only their work – in other words, dump all others. A grand feeling, for sure.
She is proud of what the firm has become. From a handful of men to thirty-two attorneys with many women. Kelly Lambert is now the firm’s first female managing partner. Jan still brags about the fact she was Kelly’s mentor.
It has been a long, long road and her retirement is well deserved. A lot of hours, but a ton of fun, too. Memory: An associate up on the piano stool at Midland Hills Country Club belting out La Bamba at the annual holiday party.
Jan is asked what she is going to do in retirement. She is tempted to say something smart-alecky, but probably won’t. Her plan, at this point, is to sign up for a creative writing workshop and try her hand at a different type of composition than legal writing.
The firm wishes her the best for this new chapter in her book of life. She will be missed – at least most of the time!
Winnie the Pooh said it best, “Goodbye…? Oh no, please. Can’t we go back to page one and start all over again?”