Robert Gray Vial's Obituary
Robert Gray Vial, 92, passed away on September 30, 2018. He was born in Louisville, KY on October 6, 1925, the only child of Solon C. and Helen Vial. He graduated high school shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor, but at 16 was too young to be called for military service and attended Wabash College. Upon his enlistment in the US Army during World War II, he fought in the Battle of the Bulge, then into Germany and east of the Elbe River towards Berlin as a member of the 35th Infantry Division, only to be ordered back west of the river due to the Potsdam Agreement. While freezing in a foxhole in Belgium, he decided that he was moving south to live in a warmer climate if he survived the war. He was being redeployed to the Pacific for the invasion of Japan when the war ended. After the war, he graduated from the University of Michigan in 1947 where he played football and was a member of Kappa Sig Fraternity. On his way to UT law school, he stopped at the SMU Kappa Sig house to spend the night and happened upon a party where he met many of his closest, lifelong friends. Deciding that Dallas was south enough, he enrolled at SMU Law School the next morning, living in his car in front of a University Park family’s house, before being able to afford an apartment with his friend and future Texas Senator, John G. Tower. After completing law school in 1950, he and Henry Kyle founded Kyle and Vial. Then, with Henry Akin, Jr. they founded Akin and Vial, which became Vial, Hamilton, Koch, and Knox. He met Claire Elaine Eastland when they lived in the same complex and they married on December 29, 1954, having four children. He was an SMU Dedman School of Law Alumni Award recipient in 1991 and was honored by the Dallas Bar Association in 2015. He was National President of the American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA) in 1995, also serving on the National Board of Directors that year, and served on the ABOTA Awards, Editorial and Website Committees. He was instrumental in founding the Tex-ABOTA Chapter in 1991 and served as Chairman from 1991-95. He loved hunting, golf and practicing law, doing the latter for 65 years. He was preceded in death by two daughters, Helaina Vial Meara, and Laurie Vial Davis, and is survived by his wife of 63+ years, Elaine Eastland Vial; his daughter and son-in-law, Jocelyn Vial Bryant and John Barclay Bryant, Jr., Atlanta, GA; his son and daughter-in-law, Robert Crist Vial and Elizabeth Boelte Vial; two grandsons, James Gray Davis and Robert Crenshaw Davis; and two nieces and one nephew. The family would like to thank the entire staff at Treemont for their wonderful and caring treatment. The funeral service will be private.
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