Starnes Aycock Law Firm celebrates 100 years in business

For 100 years, one legal entity has quietly shaped the civic and judicial life of Morganton and Burke County: Starnes Aycock Law Firm.

Through world wars, economic downturns, courthouse battles, shifting demographics, and generational change, Starnes Aycock has endured, its name shifting with the partners who carried it forward but its reputation for steady, principled practice intact.

Few businesses in Burke County can trace their roots to 1926. Fewer still can point to a lineage that includes mayors, legislators, federal prosecutors and judges on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals. From its earliest days, the firm has been intertwined with the public life of this community.

Its roster of alumni are very familiar names in the local and state halls of justice: Robert Thompson, Stephen Daniel, Samuel James Ervin III, Ellis Aycock, H. Dockery Teele, James Braxton Craven Jr., Larry Bellew, Nancy Einstein, Keith Rigsbee, Samuel Aycock, and Peggy Saunders.

Craven and Ervin each went on to serve as judges on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, appointed in 1966 and 1980 respectively.

In an era where rural communities are experiencing fewer law practices, Starnes Aycock continues on the forefront serving Burke County with a wide range of practice areas including family law, criminal defense, corporate law, estate planning, civil litigation, and personal injury.

Tom Starnes, a retired attorney who spent 43 years working at the firm, sat recently with a reporter from The Paper in his office building on Sterling Street in downtown Morganton. Serving his guest pastries and coffee, Starnes reflected on his career and the evolution of the law firm.

The firm’s name has evolved over the decades, reflecting new partners and new eras. Today the windows read Starnes Aycock Law Firm, honoring Starnes and the late Samuel Aycock, whom Starnes describes as one of the firm’s most consistent and dependable practitioners. But the through line, he said, has been integrity, a core discipline Starnes said has prevailed from the start.

Founding partners John Mull and Frank Patton each held political offices, Starnes said, with Mull serving as the mayor of Morganton, the Morganton postmaster, a school board member, and two terms in the General Assembly. Patton ran for various offices, and in 1932 was appointed for a 1-year term as an attorney for the Western District of North Carolina.

Starnes joined in 1964.

Starnes, who turns 90 on March 9, attended UNC-Chapel Hill in the late ’50s and said he had an unusual path. He participated in a program that entailed three years of business classes and one year of law school. In 1958, he graduated with a degree in business administration.

Starnes then went into active duty in the U.S. Army Reserve. After that, he worked at a bank in Wilmington before returning to Chapel Hill and completing law school in 1960.

While Craven was the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals judge, Starnes worked for him as a law clerk. One day, he got a phone call from Starnes Aycock co-founder Patton and Ervin. That conversation led to a job offer. He accepted.

One of the biggest thrills of his professional life up to that point, he said, came between the offer and starting the job.

“My wife and I were driving through town, and she grabbed my arm and said, ‘Stop and look up,’ and we were right in front of the First National Bank building. The law firm’s offices at that time were on the second floor,” Starnes said. “So, I stopped and looked up and there … already in gold leaf on the window was Patton, Ervin, and Starnes.”

Starnes said he was stunned that Patton and Ervin had added his name to the firm’s “without testing my credentials in the actual practice of law.”

When Starnes joined, the firm was in what is now a Wells Fargo bank on the corner of West Union and South Sterling streets. Shortly thereafter, the firm moved to its current location at 118 N. Sterling St.

With four consecutive attorneys who held political offices before him, Starnes said he broke the chain of political involvement.

“I had no ambition to be a judge or to become engaged in any kind of political office; I just wanted to be a good lawyer,” Starnes said.

The two current partners at Starnes Aycock, Susan Haire and James Hogan, continue the legacy of full-service legal work and community engagement. Haire serves as a member of the UNC Blue Ridge Healthcare board of directors, The Community Foundation of Burke County board as well as being a GA leader and assistant Sunday school teacher at First Baptist Church Hickory.

Hogan James is a member of St. James Episcopal Church in Lenoir where he has been a member of the choir since 1986 and served as choir director from 2000 to 2002. He has served as a member of the Vestry and was the Senior Warden in 2014.

For more information, visit www.starneslawfirm.com or call the firm at 828-437-3335.