George Alfred Strait was an outstanding individual, a community leader, a role model, and a trailblazer in the field of Law Librarianship. Born in Rhode Island in 1914, he achieved the rank of captain in the armed forces during World War II. In 1949, he earned a law degree from Suffolk University, in Boston Massachusetts. He studied Library Science at Louisiana State University and spent his early Law Librarianship career at the Worchester County Law Library (in Massachusetts) and the Social Law Library in Boston.
In the early 1950's Mr. Strait designed the library facilities at Southern University Law School before joining the faculty at Harvard Law School in 1958. During his 18 year tenure at Harvard, he took a sabbatical in the mid-1970's to organize the law library at Antioch Law School in Washington, D.C., which later became the D.C. School of Law. During this time away from Harvard, he became law Librarian and Associate Professor at Northeastern University School of Law in Boston, where he built the library facilities. From 1976 until his retirement in 1985, George was Director of the Law Library and Professor of Law at the University of Iowa College of Law.
As a member of AALL he was chair of the Chapter Committee (1968-69) and was on the Certification Board from 1974 to 1980. He was actively involved in local politics as a Selectman in Natick, Massachusetts and a City Councilman in Iowa City, Iowa. He served on the Iowa State Arts Council, the Iowa Historical Records Advisory Board, and the Iowa Commission on Aging. Mr. Strait received honorary doctorates, a special proclamation for meritorious service from the D.C. City Council, and a distinguished service award from the American Association of Law Libraries.
His colleagues gave him the highest respect as a librarian, a teacher, and a man. His students affectionately knew him as "King George." He was admired for having a vision of law libraries and Law Librarianship and bringing it into being on his own terms. He used innovative techniques to build two library collections from the ground up on a limited budgets. Mr. Strait was known for having great skill, class and audacity. He was also known for not mincing his words. Those who knew him well enough to see beneath the curmudgeonly facade knew him to be a very caring individual and a good friend. Perhaps the best tribute to Mr. Strait is part of a poem which was written upon the occasion of his retirement at University of Iowa:
"He has left his imprint
Not only on a Library he has built
On a school he has shaped
But on lives he has touched
On minds he has shaped
On a community he has enriched.
The mold is cast. It is his. His home is here.
It will wait while, like Cincinnatus,
he returns to Langellian fields - for a time."