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# WILLIAM P. BURKE## APPENDIX "A"### HISTORY OF EMPLOYMENT(Sec. 21 in Form 225; Sec. 16 in USGC Std: Form 57)The following is a complete account of my business and professional activities since my return to New Orleans, from England, in the fall of 1924.I had obtained a law degree from Harvard in 1923, but, as the law of Louisiana differs in many important respects from the Common Law, I entered Tulane University Law School, in October 1924, to study Louisiana Civil Code subjects. In the afternoons I worked as a researcher for the law firm of Spencer, Philips, Phelphs and Dunbar, (now Phelps, Dunbar, Marks and Claverie) 100 United Fruit Co. Bldg., in New Orleans, La.In July 1925 I received the degree of LLB from Tulane, passed the Louisiana Bar examinations, and entered practice as an associate of the firm named above. My salary was, as I recall it, $100.00 per month, plus 75% of the fees on the business which I originated. Such fees were negligible. My work consisted in research on matters assigned by partners of the firm, and the handling of minor matters of litigation.There were clients of the Spencer firm and the New Orleans Bank & Trust Co., a small bank which had been organized a few years previously. In 1928 the bank decided to open a Trust Department, and offered me the job of organizing and running it, at a salary of $4800.00 per year. I accepted, organized the department and operated it successfully until 1931. My work consisted in collecting bills, trusts and custodianship accounts, investing the funds of beneficiaries, administering estates and handling receiverships.In 1931 the discount department of the New Orleans Bank & Trust Co. got into difficulties, and, for the protection of the depositors, the entire bank was taken over by the Interstate Trust & Banking Co., of New Orleans. No loss was suffered by any of the customers of the Trust Department. I became assistant Trust Officer of the Interstate Bank, and could have remained there indefinitely, but I disliked the environment and the policies of the management, and I could see very little prospect for advancement, so I resigned when the trust business had been transferred.In the fall of 1931 I organized a corporation which was to erect a moving-letter sign on Canal St., similar to the one on the Times Building in New York. Revenues were to be derived from the sale of advertising which would be included among news dispatches. It proved impossible, however, to sell sufficient contracts to make the operation profitable, and I liquidated the corporation in the early part of 1932.Two of my classmates at Tulane, Herbert B. Deutch and W. Scott Morrison had been practicing law together since graduation, and were becoming quite successful. They asked me to join them, and, after the summer of 1932, I became a partner of the firm of Deutsch, Kerrigan & Burke. For the next five years we engaged in the general civil practice of law in all City, State and Federal Courts. Among others, we represented the Illinois Central Railroad, the Higgins Industries, the Whitney National Bank, the Standard Oil Company of Louisiana, the Item Co., Ltd., publisher of one of the local daily papers, the Standard Steamship Co., and a number of insurance companies, and local corporations and individuals.My work covered the whole field of civil corporate and individual practice: the preparation of pleadings, interviewing witnesses, conducting litigation, writing briefs, arguing cases in the instant and appellate courts, examining titles, administering estates, handling taxation matters, etc. My income averaged approximately $7000.00 per annum.I resigned from the firm in 1937 and continued practice, as an individual, with offices in the Canal Bank Building, until I entered military service in 1942. My income during that period varied between five and eight thousand dollars.I was on active duty in the Marine Corps from September 1 to December 1945. While I was overseas my mother died, leaving a considerable estate. I was named executor in her will, and, after my return, spent several months in administering