James Holland Bradner, Jr. ’63 died on August 16, 2007, in Lake Forest, Illinois.
Born on November 28, 1941, in Cleveland, Ohio, he prepared for college at Lakewood High School in Illinois and became a member of Theta Delta Chi Fraternity at Bowdoin. Following his graduation from Bowdoin in 1963, he graduated in 1966 from the Ohio State University College of Law and then served until 1969 in the Military Intelligence Branch of the U.S. Army in Vietnam, attaining the rank as captain. After three years as an associate in the office of Stephen J. Knerly in Cleveland, Ohio, he served for two years as the counsel with the Bar Association of Greater Cleveland, and then, in 1974, became the assistant director of the National Center for Professional Discipline with the American Bar Association in Chicago, Ill. In 1974, he became the assistant director of the American Bar Association’s National Center for Professional Discipline in Chicago. In 1978, he was appointed to the position of senior attorney in the National Strategy Program of the National District Attorneys Association Economic Crime Project. In 1981, he and Edward A. Studzinski opened their office for the practice of law in Chicago, and, in 1983, he opened his own office in Lake Forest, Ill. In 1984, he became a counsel in the law department of the Alliance of American Insurers in Schaumburg, Ill. He was general counsel for Realtime Software Corporation and chairman of the East Skokie Drainage District and had served as a deacon of the First Presbyterian Church of Lake Forest, as a lecturer in law at Chicago-Kent College of Law and the Illinois Institute of Technology. He also served as president of the Heller-Aller company in Napoleon, Ohio, and as director of the Consolidated Sales Corporation. He was also very active in Bowdoin affairs through the Alumni Fund and gifts to the Library. He was an instructor with the American Institute of Paralegal Studies, Inc., in Chicago, a commissioner with the East Skokie Drainage District, Lake County, Ill., a member of the House Committee with the Union League Club of Chicago, and was active in numerous other organizations. He was married in 1968 to Elizabeth Jean Elliott, who survives him, as do a son, James Bradner; two daughters, Carolyn Jasik and Alexandra Bradner; and two grandchildren.