SVU

CZECHOSLOVAK SOCIETY OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

JIRI GLOS

Jiri Glos, the second-term Vice President, was born on December 31, 1924 in Poznan, Poland, where his father was the Representative to the West Polish Government and Consul of the Czechoslovak Republic. He attended secondary school in Dresden, Germany and in Prague where he obtained his final certificate in 1944. He studied law at Charles University in Prague, graduated in 1948, and received the Degree of Doctor of Law on December 3, 1948. He studied foreign languages and at the end of the war  had an excellent command of  French, Spanish and English in addition to German. In 1947, he took a course in English government in the University of   London, England.  Immediately after graduation from the Faculty of Law of the Charles University, he engaged in the practice of law at the Prague Bar and worked toward a lectureship in the Faculty of Law. Having found out that his legal career would have come to an end in the Law and Bar reform of January 1, 1950, and he would  be sent to work  in coal mines in the P.T.P. military forced labor units, he crossed the border to Bavaria late in 1949.There he worked in the offices of the International Refugee Organization and with their assistance arrived in Melbourne, Australia in May, 1950.

In Melbourne, he worked in the Federal Department of Labour and National Service.  In 1953, he was awarded the Commonwealth Scholarship for the study of law in the Faculty of Law of the University of Melbourne, obtained his LL.B. in 1956, was admitted to the Victorian and Australian Bar  as Barrister and Solicitor, Barrister-at-Law of the Supreme Court of Victoria and of the High Court of Australia, and engaged in legal practice. In 1958, he came to the Yale Law School in New Haven, Connecticut, having been awarded the Sterling Fellowship. He received the degree of  LL.M. in 1959 and J.S.D. in 1960.  While working toward his Doctorate in the Yale Law School, he applied for a teaching appointment in the English law schools and was offered a lectureship of  English Common Law  in the Faculty of Law of the University of Singapore.  He taught there from 1960 to 1963, when he returned to New York. After practicing briefly in a New York law firm, he was appointed Professor of Law in the St. Mary's University School of Law  in San Antonio, Texas, in 1964.

In 1980, Prof. Glos came to Washington, D.C. to work as legal advisor to the U.S. Congress in the Law Library of Congress and was appointed Adjunct Professor of Law in the Georgetown University Law School.

In his legal career, Prof. Glos published two books and numerous articles in legal periodicals on all five continents. His main subjects are torts, property, public and private international law, and legal history.

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