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Maybe so. Maybe not.
But here’s what we know for sure. Roswell was visited by aliens in 1967. Stuart Shanor, born and raised in the far-away galaxy of Ohio, chose Roswell as his new home.
Stuart Deaton Shanor, fifty-second President of the College (2001-02) passed away peace- fully on Wednesday April 12, 2023 at the age of eighty-five, preceded in death by his wife of fifty-three years, Ellen.
Stuart was born in Canton, Ohio and raised in Springfield, Ohio. After graduating from Springfield High School in 1954, Stuart at- tended and graduated from Wittenberg Univer- sity in Springfield, Ohio, where his father was Chair of the Religion Department, in 1959. He enrolled at the University of Michigan School of Law. A good move,
he met an undergrad- uate student there and they were married De- cember 28, 1963. Stu- art and Ellen moved to
Cleveland, a likely and likeable spot for a native Ohioan, for Stuart to begin the practice of law.
But Ellen was not a native Ohioan; she was from Hobbs, New Mexico, the County Seat of Lea County on the border with Texas. On a trip to visit Ellen’s family in 1966, Stuart and Ellen decided to pick up roots and replant them in Roswell. Hobbs was a town of about 25,000 at the time; Roswell, about a hundred miles northwest, was a relative metropolis of 37,000 and offered more opportunity. Stuart interviewed and landed a job offer with a Ros- well firm and passed the New Mexico Bar Ex- amination on January 7, 1967. He never left.
Stuart began trying cases. Now, the College has always required a minimum of fifteen years of trial work before admission to the College. But
in truth, not many of us achieve the requisite lev- el of success and recog- nition in a mere fifteen years. The majority of our Fellows need twenty
FALL 2023 JOURNAL 36