Page 182 - The First Fifty Years

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176 HOUSTON LAW REVIEW
enlarged boards from the 1970s forward, would never have
occurred. (Nor, for that matter, the near drowning of the school
and the Review in 2001.) Similarly, the interregnum of White
and his associate dean, Michael T. Johnson, after Neibel’s
resignation, the deanship of George Hardy, and Johnson’s brief
stint as acting dean after Hardy’s departure, are easily
overlooked. But it was during precisely those years that the
College of Law hired the stellar array of young scholars who
would lead the school, and enrich the pages of Houston Law
Review, in the decades to come.119

Cathleen Cochran (Herasimchuk). Just as the era above was
ending, one “Cathy Herasimchuk” arrived on the HLR scene.
Like so many of the outstanding young women who traversed the
shores of the Law School Too Near the Bayou during its first five
decades (see the concluding chapter in the story of the Review’s
women editors in chief in Oddments below), she left big
footprints.120 As a student, Herasimchuk came to law school
“with the hope of making some difference in the Texas criminal
justice system,”121 met Newell Blakely on her first day of classes,
assisted him in the preparation of the Evidence Handbook’s first
edition as a 2L on Board 20, served as EIC of Board 21,
singlehandedly revised the Handbook’s second edition for
publication by Board 30, and in the process became known in
Texas legal circles as “Ms. Evidence.” She also became known as
“Cathleen Cochran,” and then “Judge Cochran,” when, after a
failed run at election to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, she
concluded that “you can’t win Dog Catcher with a name like
[Herasimchuk]”—and along with her husband adopted her
maiden name.122 Following gubernatorial appointment to the
Court and repeated reaffirmations by the voters of the state,
Judge Cochran plans to retire from a distinguished career on the
bench at the conclusion of her present term.

Benign Builders. Empire builders build mostly for their
own satisfaction; benign builders, mostly for the sake of their
institutions. The latter decades of Houston Law Review’s first
50 years were an era of benign builders. Dean Robert L.
Knauss turned the “College of Law” into the “Law Center.”123
Raymond T. Nimmer founded the Computer Law Institute.124
Mark Rothstein rejuvenated and renamed the Health Law &
Policy Institute.125 A copyright law professor and a patent law
professor created the Intellectual Property Program.126 A
“young professor” and two EICs, with the help of an acting
dean, conceived and financed the Frankel Lectures.127 Dean