History of John Smith Griffin
page 78

La Canada - 1947

At least Nephi Anderson told us that he thought he could do it for that, provided that I helped with the work. I told him that I would do all of the painting, the glazing, all my own landscaping, that I would put in the flagstone porches, front and back, and that I would also help with the rough carpentry. The lot cost $3500 and Nephi thought that he could build the home for about $11,000. We looked over several plans that Nephi had and Dorothy particularly liked one. He said that he had just finished building that home, but that the plans had been drafted by the owners (the fellow was studying architecture) and that he would have to ask permission to use the plan. He did and they not only consented but let us go through their home and see it from the inside. So with what seemed sufficient money, a plan that we liked, etc. we gave Anderson the go-ahead. It was a very lose deal. There was no contract between us - the house was to be built on cost plus 10% and as brother Anderson was in the Stake presidency I trusted him and did not require a formal contract.

All during this period I was studying hard for the bar examination that was to be held in late March, 1947. I had applied to take the attorney's examination because I thought it would be easier than the students exam. I learned that I had made a mistake. During the war in California, because of its favorable climate, many people moved in because the state was one of the main training places for the armed forces. Among them were lawyers who decided that just as soon as they got out of the service they were going to move to California to practice law. As a result there were more attorney applicants that took the examination in March of 1947 than there were students. The California Bar Association was determined that this big influx of lawyers from other states was not going to take place to the injury of the lawyers then practicing in California. The examinations were drafted accordingly. The examination was a three-day affair with three hours of questions each morning and afternoon. One question was a true and false question that had over 100 subdivisions. We took the examination at the Elks Club in the ballroom. I counted 150 others there taking the exam and I am sure that there was a like number taking it in San Francisco.

I sat next to a fellow who had been taking the quiz course with me and with whom I had discussed some of the questions asked on previous exams. At noon of the first day we went to lunch together and he started asking me how I had answered this question and that. He disagreed strongly with my answers and I went back into the exam that afternoon feeling that I had surely failed thus far in the exam. That evening we went through the same process and I really felt low. However, I firmly resolved that I would not discuss any more of the questions with him. No good could come of it and it was really doing me a lot of harm. So the next day I told him that if he wanted to go to lunch with me that it was all right but I would not discuss the questions. The examination was very difficult - much more difficult than the District of Columbia bar examination that I had taken 11 years previously. I finished the third day feeling that I had failed the examination. There were some questions that I just did not know how to answer and I had to do the best I could. My policy was to write as much as I possibly could on both sides of the question. When I saw others getting up and leaving when I was only half through I felt pretty sick, but I stayed until they called in the papers on each session.

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