Uriel loved being a lawyer and practiced until the end of 2024, retiring at the remarkable age of 94. He also had a deep love for his family and often amused his children with stories about his childhood adventures in Indian Gap. He and his brother, Lendon, kept things lively at home for their parents, but they also pitched in and worked hard from an early age.
Uriel attended school at the Indian Gap schoolhouse, graduating from high school at the ripe old age of 15. He then attended Howard Payne College before earning his law degree from Baylor University School of Law in 1951. While at Baylor, he served as editor in chief of the Baylor Law Review. Following law school, he served as a legal officer on the faculty and staff of the U.S. Army Judge Advocate General’s School in Charlottesville, Virginia, during the Korean War.
In 1954, he joined the law firm now known as Norton Rose Fulbright. For more than 70 years, he provided clients with strategic counsel on a range of transactions in real estate and energy, and he headed the firm’s energy and real estate practice for many years. In 2002, he was one of 25 lawyers named to Best of the Best in the oil and gas practice area by Euromoney Institutional Investor PLC.
Later in his career, he served as the firm’s general counsel, providing risk management guidance and compliance advice to attorneys. In that position, he offered thoughtful, wise counsel, and every partner knew him as the author of the firm’s partnership agreement. When he joined the firm in 1954, it had fewer than 50 lawyers; he witnessed its growth to over 700 attorneys and played a key role in every merger, acquisition, and combination. Perhaps most importantly, he was unfailingly a dedicated firm partner and friend.
Uriel was honored for his achievements by Baylor Law School with the naming of the “Gibson Gayle Jr. and Uriel Dutton Main Reading Room.” He also served on the MD Anderson Foundation’s Board of Trustees/Directors for nearly 40 years and was a Life Fellow of the American Bar Association, the State Bar of Texas, and the Houston Bar Association.
Not long after joining Fulbright, he met Bernie and they married soon after. They had four children together and were married for 35 years. They enjoyed many great adventures as a family—rafting, camping, and scuba diving. In 1995, he married Winona and, in later years, the family enjoyed countless games of rummy, always played using Uriel’s unique and often debated set of rules.
Uriel is survived by his wife, Winona; Winona’s children, Melissa and wife Charlotte, and Buck; his four children, Troy and wife Maureen, Steve and wife Bea, Laurie, and Lea; his first wife, Bernie; his grandchildren, Troy, Mattie and husband Walter, and Lindsey and husband Richard; his great-grandchildren, Ford, Billy, and Lola; and his brother Lendon’s children, Jeff, D’Anne, Lenda, and their families.
In lieu of flowers, donations in honor of Uriel’s mother are welcome to the Belfer Neurodegeneration Consortium, an MD Anderson Alzheimer’s research consortium.
Website: https://www.belferndc.org/
Donate Here:
https://gifts.mdanderson.org/Default.aspx?tsid=29644
