About Andrew Brandt
Andrew Brandt is an editor on Super Lawyers‘ staff. He serves as the editor for the Illinois, Northern California, Upstate New York, Missouri-Kansas, and Texas magazines, and he additionally writes, fact-checks and proofreads for numerous other Super Lawyers issues (and for the website). He graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with degrees in English literature and environmental studies, and his byline has appeared in a variety of places, both online and in print.
Articles written by Andrew Brandt
The Second-Happiest Place on Earth
Fred Schenk is the magic behind the San Diego County FairFred Schenk grew up in Los Angeles but has fond memories of going to the San Diego County Fair as a teenager. “My sister was in law school,” says the partner at Casey Gerry Schenk Francavilla Blatt & Penfield, “and I would come down in the summer to visit, and she and her husband would take me to the fair. I grew to love it.” He also grew to run it. In 2002, Schenk was one of nine members appointed to the board of the 22nd District Agricultural Association by Gov. Gray Davis. The …
Creating Families
Evie Jeang takes international divorce and surrogacy to the next levelWhen she was 4 years old and living in Taipei, Taiwan, Evie Jeang wanted to be a judge. That year, her parents divorced, and her mom left for the U.S. to start over—leaving Jeang in the care of her grandmother. “She pretty much raised me and my sister with her retirement money and whatever money that my mom could send to her,” says the founder and managing partner at Ideal Legal Group. “So, when I was little, I would go to the courthouse and listen to cases. I wanted to be the judge …
Making the Pieces Fit
When putting together an estate plan, the details matter. Even personal details. Even very personal details. “This can be really hard for people,” says Jean Hegler, an estate planning and probate attorney at Brosnan & Hegler, LLP in Garden City. “They’re meeting you for the first time, and they have to tell you all the things about their family — who’s the alcoholic and who’s got a secret affair.” Though it may be an uncomfortable conversation, says Hegler, it needs to take …
It Gets Better
Meet a couple of re-married divorce attorneysWhen Kristen Carey and Jason Sposeep met at a young alumni event for Chicago-Kent College of Law in 2011, they realized they had a lot in common. For one, they were working at competing divorce firms across the street from one another. Two, both were divorced. “And we’ve been together ever since,” says Carey, of Kamerlink, Stark, Powers & McNicholas, on the east side of North LaSalle Street. They wed in 2014, have one child together and co-parent Sposeep’s daughter from his …
Thrillers Gotta Thrill
Three local attorneys have second lives as historical thriller authorsWriting a novel—especially your first one—can be a daunting task. But for Van R. Mayhall Jr., forming a narrative wasn’t even the toughest part. “I couldn’t type,” says the Breazeale, Sachse & Wilson business attorney. “My method of typing was emails only, preferably one or two words, that I would peck out with my index fingers. And so, the first three chapters of Judas the Apostle, I hand wrote on a yellow pad and asked my assistant to type them out.” Mayhall learned how …
The Music Man
Steve Elville helps tune up local music programsWhen Steve Elville wanted to run advertisements for his elder law and estate planning firm, Columbia’s Elville and Associates, he chose classical music station WBJC 91.5. That led to an idea. “I was thinking about my own interest in music, and our relationship with the station, and it occurred to me that [a charity devoted to] children and music would be great,” says Elville, who grew up playing piano. So he established Elville Center for the Creative Arts, a nonprofit that donates …
Where There’s Smoke, There’s John V. McCoy
Following fires and finding who’s at faultI spent four years as a military lawyer, and joined a firm in 1988. [Until] the first day I worked on this case, I don’t think I even knew that there was such a thing as propane. I would have had no idea there was even an area of litigation involving fires and explosions. I was assigned to a very large industrial fire up in Manitowoc, where I represented a propane retailer. We settled the morning of trial at 2 a.m., and that became the largest verdict in the history of the state at that …
Setting the Bar
How Niki Cung became the first Vietnamese-American attorney in ArkansasWhen Niki Cung left Vietnam for the U.S. in 1975, she was too young to remember the journey. “My mom has told me stories about having to hide one of my sisters and me in the floorboard of a van so that we could get to our meeting spot—so that we could get out of the country,” says the civil litigation attorney at Kutak Rock in Fayetteville, Arkansas. “She is one of my heroes—along with my dad.” Cung was the youngest of nine kids. Her father was in the South Vietnamese Army and her …
Keith Mark’s Excellent Adventures
The Mark & Burkhead lawyer’s never-ending hunt for bigger gameKeith Mark has been tied to hunting his entire life. As a young boy in Kansas City, Kansas, he watched his father and grandfathers leave the house to go catfishing and hunt birds, wishing he could go. He tagged along even before he could legally shoot. After he got his license, he hunted quail and pheasant with his dad. At college, he began turkey and deer hunting, and once he began practicing law, he sought out bigger game. “I went on a black bear hunt, and then started elk hunting,” says …
A Conservationist’s Close Up
National Geographic-published photographer John Rollins on how he doesn’t let anything get in the way of the perfect shot—not even a gorilla’s fistI got interested in photography during the first international trip I took—to Peru in 2005. I had a dinky point-and-shoot camera that held 15 images. I saw such amazing things, but got back and didn’t have any real photos to show. So the next trip I bought a nicer camera, and the next trip a nicer camera. Now I usually have two cameras rigged—a Nikon D4S and a Nikon D800. Part of what I’m trying to do with photography—and it’s not just me, but a whole group of photographers …
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