In Memoriam: Donald Glazer

Ropes & Gray is saddened to report the passing of retired partner Donald Glazer on October 25. He was 80 years old.

Don lived an incredibly rich life. He was a graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School, where he served as an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He went on to earn an L.L.M. at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. Don joined Ropes & Gray in 1970, became a partner in 1978 and served as the inaugural chair of the firm’s emerging companies group. Colleagues remember Don as a consummate corporate and securities lawyer—the firm’s leading expert on both Section 16 of the Exchange Act and legal opinions—and as someone who exemplified Ropes & Gray’s commitment to mentoring. He was a natural teacher who taught securities law to incoming associates and also lectured at Harvard Law School.

Don was also an author, and an utter perfectionist when it came to legal writing—he once marked up his own words a dozen times in his quest to make his point most precisely. He literally “wrote the book” on both Massachusetts corporate law and closing opinions, and one colleague recalls that “discussing these topics with him was both exhilarating and terrifying.”  His Glazer and Fitzgibbon on Legal Opinions (the fourth edition of which Don completed just before his passing) and Massachusetts Corporation Law & Practice are standards in the field. Late in his life, Don’s writing took a different turn—he published a collection of poems titled Uninvited Guests this past year.

Don was a partner from 1978 until he left the firm in 1992 to pursue a career in business. He later resumed his legal career, which included working with Ropes & Gray colleagues on his writing.  Don had a varied business career. He was chairman of the Board of Trustees of GMO Trust for more than two decades and served on numerous other corporate boards. He also found time to pursue a variety of hobbies, including magic, travel (he was an adventurer with a special fondness for the Caribbean) and tennis, which he played “ferociously,” according to those who knew his game. Don will be deeply missed.