AUSTIN, Texas – The University of Texas School of Law announced today that Bryan A. Garner, a 1984 graduate of the Law School, donated a first edition of Black's to the Jamail Center for Legal Research in honor of the director, Professor Roy M. Mersky. Garner is the editor of the Black's Law Dictionary and one of the world’s leading lexicographers.
The book, published in 1891, is now part of the Jamail Center's outstanding collection of law dictionaries.
Yesterday at an informal ceremony, Dean Bill Powers presented the gift to Mersky on behalf of Garner and his wife, Pan Garner. Garner inscribed the book to Mersky as "the greatest law librarian of his day -- and very likely the greatest ever."
As the Director of the Law Library since 1965, Mersky has built the Jamail Center into one of the foremost legal research institutions in the United States, if not the world. In addition, directors of many of the nation's academic law libraries got their start under his supervision. His textbook, Fundamentals of Legal Research is now in its 8th edition and continues to be widely used in first year legal research classes.
As the editor of the 7th edition of Black's Law Dictionary, Garner undertook the first complete overhaul of this standard work. He has been called “the preeminent expert in America on good legal writing.” As the author of “The Oxford Dictionary of American Usage and Style” and several important legal writing handbooks, Garner is a leader in the field.
Henry Campbell Black's Dictionary of American Law has been the most
important and influential law dictionary since it first appeared in 1891.