CTK History
Louis A. Trosch and Robert G. Williams formed a partnership in the practice of law in 1970 under the partnership name of "Trosch & Williams Law Firm", which was located at the corner of 5th Street and Caswell Road in Charlotte, North Carolina.
In its first year, the firm had one small attorney's office and one secretarial station with no reception area. If either partner had a conference with a client, the other partner had to go next door to a restaurant until the conference was completed. The two partners' spouses, Minette Trosch and Marilyn Williams, acted as secretaries and performed all the secretarial duties. There were no paralegals in those days.
Louis Trosch concentrated on a general office practice with specialties in real estate closings, general corporate law, and wills and estates, while Robert Williams devoted most of his practice as an arbitrator in management-labor disputes. Between 1970 and 1974, the firm's clientele increased and it outgrew its two-room office on Caswell Road.
In 1974, Mr. Theodore Charles Conrad, known to everyone as T. C. Conrad, sold his partnership interest in his CPA firm "Conrad, Hoey, East & Co.", at the age of 71, and joined Trosch & Williams as a partner. The firm became known as "Conrad Trosch & Williams", and it was an ideal time to move its offices to the Charlotte Merchandise Mart located at the corner of Briar Creek Road and Independence Boulevard. They remained at that location until 1978 when an office became available at the Colwick Towers in Cotswold on Colwick Road. The new office was ideally located in close proximity to all three partners' residences. It had sufficient parking and was conveniently located for its clients.
The firm continued to grow from 1974 to 1982. Its real estate practice blossomed as Charlotte grew. Because of Mr. Conrad's wealth of experience and expertise in tax law, estate planning and estate administration, the firm's will, estate planning, and probate practice flourished. To accommodate the increasing number of clients, Fred DeVore joined the firm upon his graduation from Wake forest Law School in 1982 and became the firm's first associate. Mr. DeVore and Mr. Trosch together established a computerized Will program and the firm became the participating attorney for a major prepaid legal plan, Personal Legal Plans, which today provides a major portion of the firm's clientele. Although he left to form his own firm closer to the courthouse, Fred DeVore has kept close ties with our law firm to this date. The firm continues to co-counsel litigation cases with Fred DeVore and in 1990, the two firms settled a $3 million law suit which was the 15th largest settlement in the state of North Carolina that year.
In 1985, the firm moved to its present location, the Parkview Building, in Southpark at 5821 Fairview Road, Suite 405, Charlotte, NC 28209. Because Southpark is one of the fastest growing metropolitan areas beyond the confines of downtown Charlotte, it provides an ideal location for the firm's general office practice in real estate, corporate law, and will and probate administration. In addition, because the firm is located in the same building as Personal Legal Plans, it is better able to service the over 50,000 plan members as the participating law firm of the prepaid legal plan. Mr. Williams left the firm in 1986 to specialize in his expertise of arbitration and to this date is consulted on major decisions.
As the firm continued to branch out to serve its clients, an additional attorney was needed. Thus, in the summer of 1987, Michael J. Kemmy joined the firm as its second associate. He became a partner in 1992 and the firm changed its name at that time to "Conrad Trosch & Kemmy". Mr. Conrad continued to handle tax matters and estate tax planning. Mr. Kemmy took charge of the Personal Legal Plans pre-paid legal plan division and implemented the Professional Advisory Service, which provided the impetus for a surge of legal business for the firm in the 1990s. In addition, Mr. Kemmy and Mr. Trosch together handled the office practice, including the probate and estate practice, real estate closings and corporate practice.
The law firm continued to expand and hired Don Carroll as an "of counsel" attorney. Mr. Carroll stayed with the firm on this basis for two years, and he personally steered the firm into a litigation practice. He hired and trained Christopher C. Fialko, who joined the firm directly out of law school in 1992. Mr. Carroll left the law firm in the beginning of 1994 to take a position in public service as the State Director of the State Bar Association's PALS Division. Mr. Fialko left the firm shortly thereafter to form his own firm.
In the 1990s, under the leadership of Mr. Trosch and Mr. Kemmy, the law firm grew rapidly as its reputation in real estate, probate administration, corporate and litigation became known in the Charlotte community. Six associates were hired in the 1990s and five continue to be with the law firm. Gary L. Loflin, a graduate of UNC Law School, was hired in the Spring of 1993. He currently heads up the residential real estate closing division. William Conrad Trosch was hired in the fall of 1993 after graduating from UNC Law School. He oversees the litigation department along with his brother, Louis A. Trosch, Jr., who left the Children's Law Center to join the firm in the summer of 1995. Lou is also a graduate of UNC Law School.
Because of the rapid growth of the litigation department and the necessity for the litigation attorneys to be in proximity to the courthouse, the firm opened up a branch office in the Cameron Brown Building at 301 South McDowell Street. William Conrad Trosch and Louis A. Trosch, Jr., handle all of the firm's civil and criminal litigation matters from that branch office.
In the Fall of 1995, after graduating from UNC Law School, Minette Trosch joined the law firm after being introduced to the Mecklenburg Bar Association by her father, T. C. Conrad, and her husband, Louis A. Trosch, Sr. Mr. Conrad died three months later at the age of 92. He remained with the law firm up until he was 92. He remained with the law firm for over 20 years and worked every day from 1974 until his death on December 17, 1995. Upon joining the firm, Minette Trosch took over the firm's brand new second mortgage and non-conforming loan division. After she organized and streamlined the division, the law firm hired Jeffrey J. Werner in1996 after his gradation from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law located in Cleveland, Ohio, to manage the division. This gave Minette the opportunity to develop domestic relations and public interest law practice within the firm. Because of her need to be close to the courthouse, she joined her two sons in the Cameron-Brown Building in March of 1997.
Today the firm is a stark contrast from its humble beginnings in 1970 when it had two attorneys and the firm's office equipment consisted of one manual typewriter. Today the firm has seven attorneys and nine staff members located in two offices with the most modern computer, copying, fax and telecommunication technologies. In the last 26 years, the firm has handled over 10,000 legal matters and has drafted over 80,000 Wills--probably more Wills than any law firm in the state. It has settled a three million dollar law suit. Although the law firm of Conrad Trosch & Kemmy has had rapid growth, the firm's goal is to continue to operate in an informal and friendly atmosphere in which service to our clients will continue to be the firm's guiding star.