Roger Groot, R.I.P.

I heard a rumor yesterday that my old criminal law professor had died of a heart attack while hunting over the weekend. It's been confirmed now.

Known throughout W&L as the Groot-Monster, Prof. Groot was easily the scariest professor I ever had. Ex-Marine Corp, large commanding presence and perpetual scowl, his classroom trademark was a pair of red suspenders and a large coffee mug shaped like a shotgun shell. His Socratic grillings were legendary. And God help the idiot who thought he could bluff or b.s. his way through a session with the man - there are scorch marks all over the chairs in his classroom that serve as testimony to what happened to such folk. Nontheless, behind the aggressive exterior, you also knew that he only had your best interest in mind. Of course, that didn't make the aggression any less genuine, and indeed, helped to inflame it if Groot thought a poor performance was the result of shear mental laziness or skimped prep work. The article sums things up pretty nicely:

Groot the professor could be as demanding of his students as he was of himself.

As he surveyed the classroom through round eyeglasses, "you felt like no matter how far back in the room you were, when he focused on you, you could have been two inches from his nose," said Victor Cardwell, a Roanoke attorney and a former student.

Students who neglected the required reading would skip class rather than face the professor's wrath. And even those who thought they knew the material would often leave the classroom in what Barnhill called a state of "intellectual vertigo."

It was known on campus as being "Grootinized," Cardwell said. But most students saw past the professor's gruff exterior.

I never worked so hard in school, either undergrad or law, as I did for his class. But then again, I never learned as much either. And while one the favorite pastimes of the LMC and me when we get together is to trade old war stories about Groot, we remember the pain fondly now.

It's still a shock that he died so suddenly. But I don't doubt that he aced the Heavenly Bar exam.