Fritz Langrock: Aba Treasurer and Volunteer Extraordinaire

• Year: 2025
• Citation: Vol. 51 No. 1

Fritz Langrock: ABA Treasurer and Volunteer Extraordinaire Vol. 51 No. 1 Pg. 8 Vermont Bar Journal Spring 2025

Interview by Kim Veik, Esq.

KSV: Hi Fritz! As you know, for this feature we interview legal professionals with interests and passions outside of the practice of law which help keep them balanced. We're pushing that boundary a bit this time as I've asked you to talk about - among other things - your many years of involvement with the ABA. Clearly, work for the nation's largest voluntary legal association sounds like "work" to most of us - or at least work-adjacent. But you have been doing it for so long, rising in summer 2023 to Treasurer of the organization, that you must find it rewarding in it. Is that a fair statement?

FL: Yes, it is, I am an ABA nerd for sure.

KSV: I'm going to ask you to elaborate on that in a minute, but I always like to start these interviews with a little basic introduction to the subject. Obviously the "Langrock" name is one to conjure with in Vermont legal circles, but can you share a bit about your origins? Where'd you grow up?

FL: I grew up in Salisbury, just south of Middlebury with my parents, my sister Katie and my brother Eric. My dad, [Peter Langrock] as well as being a lawyer, used to raise and race harness horses, so I grew up on a working horse farm. We also had sheep and a few cattle too. As a teenager I trained and raced a horse named Little Whiz.

My Dad was (and is) active in the ABA and the Uniform Law Commission, so our family summer vacations tended to be ABA or Uniform Law Commission meetings. So, in a way I grew up in the ABA.

KSV: OK. I have to hear more about having summer vacations as a kid at ABA or Uniform Law Commission meetings. Did you have fun doing that?

FL: I did have fun. The meetings were often in fun places. I remember meetings in Vail, San Francisco and Hawaii. When I was around 13, we were in Hyannis, MA at a resort where the Jackson Five were also staying. I played tennis a couple of courts down from Michael who was already famous. Also, I had friends that were also ABA or ULC brats and would see them at the meetings.

KSV: And Little Whiz? A few details please!

FL: Little Whiz was a trotting mare. She

had a lot of heart but was not fast enough to race at Saratoga. My Dad raced her at the fairs around Vermont and New York, many of which featured harness racing back then. I trained her on the track we had at home, and when I was 14, I raced a few times in Westport, New York.

KSV: That's fun. Where'd you go to school when you weren't going to ABA meetings or training horses?

FL: I went to Middlebury Union High School, college at the University of Chicago and law school at UCLA.

KSV: I know you started full-time practice as a mediator not quite two years ago. Can you describe the path you took, professionally, to get to where you have arrived now?

FL: I started my legal career in a big firm in Chicago in 1988 and moved home to Vermont in 1992. I spent 32 years as a general practice lawyer and primarily as a litigator at Langrock Sperry &Wool. Eleven years ago I was diagnosed with cancer and went through about a year and a half of surgeries, radiation and chemotherapy. I came out of that knowing that I needed to find some new directions in my life. I started seeing a therapist and began a mediation practice as part of my recovery.

It was after that, and after I gave up alcohol six years...