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Men matter, and can make a difference, for good or ill. In Mark Wilmer we have a man who mattered mightily in the development of the Southwest, and in the ability of our country to achieve what many believe is Manifest Destiny, the inevitable westward expansion of our nation. Mark was a man who stood on its head Shakespeare’s gloomy observation that “The evil men do lives after them, the good is oft interred with their bones.” The good Mark Wilmer did certainly lives after him and will remain a monument to his skill, courage, and character for generations to come. This volume is a tribute to Mark as a lawyer, a visionary, and a man. It was my good fortune to know and work with him as a colleague and friend. As Jack August points out in this highly readable volume, Mark and I often roamed the state in search of places in which we could fish, hunt, and––most important––just talk. He was simply good company. In this day when “mentoring” has been raised to the top of the agenda of most law firms, it is difficult to convey how desperate new, young lawyers once were for advice and counseling from older colleagues of the “sink or swim” school. Law school may be a wonderful place in which to become acquainted with some of the tools of the trade, but only the tutelage of a wise, experienced colleague can teach the bearer of a newly minted degree how to turn those tools into implements useful to clients, the community, and the state in which we are privileged to live. Mark was just such a colleague. Whenever I needed advice on theory or tactics in a particular matter, I could turn to Mark and count on a thoughtful , imaginative––and equally important to a youngster––courteous and respectful response. And much more. Mark not only knew what the law was, but he had a fine sense of what it ought to be, and how best to undertake the task of bringing the law more in line with good public policy. As we look around Phoenix and Arizona today, it is difficult to remember what the city and state were like before Mark watered these seedling communities. Dr. August describes the Arizona that Mark encountered in 1931 as “a harsh and arid environment.” Phoenix was a city of 48,000 souls FOREWORD living in a state that counted its population as a mere 435,000. And such a national backwater it might have remained had not Mark and others waged the legal and political battles described in this book to get Arizona the water that would turn it from “harsh and arid” into a destination of choice, and Phoenix from, quite literally, a cow town into the fifth largest city in America. Of course, Mark’s achievement in wresting for Arizona the water needed to accommodate growth is not the only reason for our growth: the development of air conditioning helped. But it was Mark, and later the electric utility organized by Frank Snell, who made it possible for us to conquer nature. The magnitude of Mark’s achievement during the long litigation over the allocation of available water cannot be overestimated, and is brilliantly told here. The difficulty Mark faced can best be understood from Mark’s own appraisal, cited by Dr. August. When he finally agreed, at Governor McFarland’s urging, to take over the case, Mark described it as being in “a hell of a mess.” As any reader of this book will come to agree, that was a serious understatement. What is not well known is the challenging personal context in which Mark accepted this assignment. Not only were Mark and Frank Snell building and leading what had become the state’s preeminent law firm, but Mark, widely considered the Dean of Arizona trial lawyers, was certainly not short of major litigation that required his attention. Parachuting into such a difficult situation as the water case had become, with so much at stake for our community and state, took both extraordinary commitment and courage. As detailed by Dr. August, Mark devoted countless hours to becoming completely familiar with the substantial legal and factual background and the evidence already presented to the Master. Then, although Arizona had finished putting on its case in chief, and while California was presenting its case, Mark “pulled the plug” with only the hope––and certainly no assurance––that the...

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