New Orleans jazz filled Grove Street for a send-off to Stanton Wheeler, a legal pioneer.
Hundreds of people attended a ceremony Wednesday at the Grove Street Cemetery for Wheeler, a Yale Law School professor and avid jazz trumpeter who died last Friday at the age of 77. Law School Dean Harold Hongju Koh and federal judge Stephen Reinhardt, a lifelong friend, offered eulogies that paid tribute to Wheeler’s ground-breaking studies of white-collar crime and juvenile delinquency, his path-breaking career as a sociologist-turned-law professor, his devotion to family, his support for civil rights, his promotion of sports opportunities for young people, and his love affair with jazz.
So it was fitting that some of his jazz buddies led the procession from the cemetery to a reception at Yale’s Morse College, where the gentle and modest Wheeler once served as master.
Click on the play arrow for a sample.
“Do you know anyone else,” Dean Koh asked, “who would be mourned today, as Stan is, in blogs about Law and Society, White Collar Crime, and New Orleans Jazz?” Click here for the full text of Koh’s tribute.
Click here and here for New York Times and L.A. Times obituaries that detail Wheeler’s professional accomplishments. The latter details his two-year effort overseeing the distribution of $93 million left over from the 1984 Olympics to community projects.
Wheeler’s survivors include his wife, Marcia Chambers, the Independent’s Branford Eagle columnist.
Wheeler’s Dixieland compatriots included Clamdigger Charlie Salerno. He brought his cherished 1930 Gibson banjo for the occasion. A memorial jazz concert for Wheeler is planned for the spring.
Thank you to Paul Bass and the Independent for covering this event. Heartfelt thanks also to Dr. Koh and Judge Reinhardt for your warm and generous remarks, and to Dr. Kyle and family for offering the Morse College Master's residence for the reception. And thank you to all who attended, both in body and spirit. Your many kind words have been truly uplifting to us all.
Sincerely,
Kenneth Wheeler