by Anthony DeMatteo
Staff Writer
Friends and colleagues of Jacksonville attorney Edward Booth, who died last May, gathered Monday at the Duval County Courthouse for a service in his honor.
“Eddie was just as classy as it gets, a real gentleman, very soft-spoken and frighteningly well-prepared,” said local attorney Robert Harris.
Former Jacksonville Mayor Ed Austin, who once worked under Booth in the solicitor’s office, spoke at the service organized by Booth’s friend and colleague, Warren Anderson.
Booth’s son, Edward “Skip” Booth, Jr., showed pictures of his father in a slide-show presentation.
“My dad thought the world of everyone in this room,” said Booth. “His profession as a lawyer was his life.”
Booth showed a 1963 newspaper article chronicling Austin and his father’s hiring of two black assistants.
“I don’t think history has properly recorded – what a courageous act that must have been,” said Booth. “The [Ku Klux] Klan was meeting regularly in this town. And they did this without a court telling them to do this. They did it because it was the right thing to do.”
Austin’s assistant, Leander Shaw, later became a Florida Supreme Court justice.