Memoir draft, 2015

This collection includes reports, research, correspondence, meeting minutes and agendas, speeches, clippings, recorded interviews, photographs, and ephemera covering Ellis’s involvement with King County civic projects, as well as biographical writings, awards and limited materials related to the history of the Preston Gates & Ellis law firm and partners. Materials cover Forward Thrust initiatives, Lake Washington cleanup efforts and the creation of Metro (formally the Municipality of Metropolitan Seattle), Ellis’s position as a Ford Foundation board member, creation of the Mountains to Sound Greenway Trust, Washington State Convention Center building and expansion, preservation of farmlands initiatives, and others.

Materials in the History of law firm series refer to the law firm known as Preston, Thorgrimson & Horowitz when Ellis joined it in 1949. Throughout the years, the firm changed names multiple times to reflect partners and mergers. Materials present in this collection mostly cover biographical research on the partners of the firm and materials related to mergers, awards and other business of the company during its time as Preston, Thorgrimson, Horowitz, Starin and Ellis, and as Preston, Thorgrimson, Ellis & Holman just before their merger with Shidler, McBroom, Gates & Lucas to create Preston, Thorgrimson, Shidler, Gates & Ellis in 1990.