Well, Matt LeMaster played linebacker on the U of O gridiron - not as a first-stringer, but as the scholastic heavyweight who kept the team’s GPA above threshold.  When he’s talking to his UW educated wife, Karen, or his UW law school classmates, or his current UW law students, he’s definitely a Dawg.  If Matt’s reminiscing with family, he’s a Coug, because he was raised in Pullman where his dad chaired Wazzu’s Forestry and Range Management Department, and where he met Karen, his high school love.

 

Following college and ROTC, Matt hooked up with the Army Corps of Engineers as a combat engineer.  He survived the Army’s fiercest gut-checks - Ranger and Airborne Schools – fully combat-ready for assaults on German beer halls.

 

He served his time, then earned his law degree at the UW, and hitched up first with Riddel Williams, then with Heller Ehrman.  The mergers and acquisitions business was booming and Matt was at the forefront, negotiating and cranking out transactions. He gained esteem as a deal making lawyer and was called front and center to multiple forums to share his mergers and acquisitions wisdom.  There wasn’t much air in his calendar for extracurricular activities outside work and family, but he committed eight years of service above all else at the Rotary Club of Bellevue and as counsel to Hire American Heroes.

 

Though Matt’s legal career flourished, Heller Ehrman suffered a crippling financial implosion.  He had to jump ship.  And that he did, piling his files into his pickup early one dark morning, taking them, and his well-founded mergers and acquisitions expertise, right into the law offices of Davis Wright Tremaine. 

 

As much as he had solid resume strength headed into this unwelcomed transition, he needed to double down on his practice to support his new firm.  He Necessarily, he had to put Rotary on ice.  Matt found a niche in the universe of mergers and acquisitions lawyers – doing acquisitions, dispositions and more for manufactured tech and hotel businesses.  If this is you and you need legal counsel, then call Matt.  As Tom Bodett once put it, he’ll even leave a light on for you. 

 

Matt chairs Davis Wright Tremaine’s mergers and acquisitions practice. As a corporate lawyer, he’s highly acclaimed.  I won’t reveal what I know about his client list, but know it’s impressive.  Someone once told me that if you want something done, give it to a busy person who loves their work – that’ll be Matt. 

 

A huge shout out to his mentor, good friend, and sponsor, Jimmy Collins, for steering Matt back into Rotary.  We owe a big bravo to co-sponsor Mark Davis, as well, for reuniting this ”Dawg on Coug ‘n Duck” stellar professional and human being, with Rotary, and especially with Seattle 4.