by Cynthia Price
Legal News
Once an Eagle, always an Eagle.
So says, Christopher L. Edgar, Miller Johnson attorney who was given the National Outstanding Eagle Scout Award Monday night, the highest award given, by the President Gerald R. Ford Council of the Boy Scouts of America.
Edgar proudly points out that Gerald R. Ford was himself an Eagle Scout — in fact, the only U.S. President who had earned that honor.
Edgar himself became an Eagle Scout in 1960.
Though almost everyone knows about boy scouting, Eagle Scouts are a little more obscure. Eagle is the highest rank in boy scouting. Because of the extensive criteria for earning it, it is given to older scouts, so by the time many young men are of an age eligible to receive it, they may have lost interest in scouting.
“There is a clear pathway to becoming an Eagle Scout which has been in place for years,” Edgar says. “The most difficult part is having to accomplish a significant service project, the scout has to come up with the idea himself, write it up, get it approved, and then execute it. That’s over and above getting a number of badges, which an Eagle Scout has to do as well.”
Though by the end of 2012, over 2,200,000 scouts had been given the Eagle Scout distinction, that represents only about 2% of those with Boy Scout memberships.
At Monday night’s ceremony, 250 new Eagle Scouts were to be honored from the 25 counties covered by the President Gerald R. Ford Council.
The Building Character Celebration draws hundreds of spectators to DeVos Center. The President Gerald R. Ford Council will also honor Traverse City Fire Chief Pat Parker with the same National Outstanding Eagle Scout Award Edgar is getting. Speaking at the event was Charles Gemar, one of more than forty NASA astronauts who are Eagle Scouts.
In addition to Gerald R. Ford, a wide array of well-known people are Eagle Scouts, including former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, Pulitzer Prize-winner E.O. Wilson, Academy Award winners Michael Moore (another Michigander) and Steven Spielberg, and Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York City.
On Monday, Edgar said about that evening’s ceremony, “Tonight is kind of a big deal. Eight hundred people are expected.”
But as a seasoned lawyer, Edgar has the skills to take any situation in stride. He has not only won many honors from the legal community, but also spoken widely on his area of expertise.
According to Edgar, with the exception of a “couple years’ stint as a prosecutor for a small municipality,” and some municipal work he did while at Law Weathers, where he was before starting at Miller Johnson seven years ago, he has spent his career in estate planning, probate, and counsel to closely-held businesses.
His practice has a particular emphasis on long-term business planning including succession. “ Part of that is working with agriculture related entities,” Edgar says. “For the most part they’re family businesses.” He also has experience in associated real estate issues, including oil and gas leasing, but adds, “Other than that, I’m definitely not a real estate lawyer.” He also has experience in establishing conservation easements.
Edgar has regularly made presentations for the Institute of Continuing Legal Education since 1995, and in March 2010 spoke before the West Michigan Estate Planning Council, which he also serves as President.
He is a Fellow of the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel, a member of the State Bar of Michigan, including the Probate and Trust Law, Business Law, and the fledgling Agricultural Law sections, and active in the American Bar Association. He is on the Construction and Commercial Law Panels for the American Arbitration Association.
Edgar has also won many honors in the legal profession, including a listing in “The Best Lawyers in America®” for Closely Held Companies and Family Business Law, Trusts and Estates including litigation, and is a Michigan “Super Lawyer” for estate planning and probate.
For that matter, this is not the first Boy Scout award Edgar has received. He had previously won the Boy Scout’s Silver Beaver Award, which is a council-level distinguished service award.
The Boy Scouts of America’s Michigan councils have recently reorganized. Grand Rapidian Michael Melinn served as President of the Transition Board for the state.
As a result of that transition, there is now just one Council for the state of Michigan, called the Michigan Crossroads Council. In turn that is divided into four field service councils.
What was formerly the Gerald R. Ford Council, serving ten counties, is now the President Gerald R. Ford Field Service Council (FSC), serving 25. The counties cover most of the Western part of the state, south as far as Allegan and Barry, but all the way up to Emmett and Cheboygan in the northern lower peninsula.
At the time of President Ford’s death, when federal magistrate Hugh Brenneman was president of the Gerald R. Ford Council, it was Eagle Scouts who lined Pearl Street to honor the former president.
Edgar is still on the board of directors for the President Gerald R. Ford FSC and serves as the Crossroads Council’s Vice President of Endowment.
When his sons were growing up, in addition to a brief period as scoutmaster for a Webelos troop, he served as assistant scoutmaster for local Troop 253 for 20 years. He was happy to remain the assistant because, he says, “We had a really great scoutmaster. Those scout leaders are the real heroes of the scouting movement in my opinion.”
Both of his sons, Andrew and Robbie, are Eagle Scouts. Both grew up to be engineers, while his daughter Sarah is in sales. Sarah and Andrew live in California, while Robie remains here.
Edgar himself grew up in Athens, Tenn. and attended Vanderbilt University Law School in Nashville after getting his undergraduate degree from Duke University.
He moved to this area because he and his wife had visited Grand Rapids, and, he says, “We just really liked it.”
Edgar says that he has never forgotten the discipline of scouting, or the values in the Boy Scout Law, which calls for a scout to be trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent. He observes that, when he served in the U.S. Navy from 1968 to 1972, “I’m quite certain that my scouting experience helped me gain admission to Officer Candidate Training.”
He relates a story told to him that when reporters asked President Ford about his boy scouting past, the president pulled out his handbook with the scout oath (which says a scout will do his best to “keep myself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight”) and the scout law, asking something like, “If you see something wrong with this, let me know.”
Edgar comments, “Scouting offers you a code to live your life, and I’ve tried to live by it.
“Becoming an Eagle Scout is not just for ‘the smart kids.’ It’s a long distance race, and any child who’s in scouting can reach that goal if he sticks to it, and through it can learn how to become a leader.”
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