Ooms’ help critical in building the golden arches

Tuesday, April 4, 2006 | 7:16 a.m.

In 1954 a restaurant supply company owner asked attorney Owen Ooms to write up a franchise agreement for the purchase of a tiny, seemingly insignificant hamburger joint in San Bernardino, Calif.

Ooms' document, though, was anything but insignificant because it helped pave the way for the meteoric development of the multibillion-dollar fast-food industry.

The name of the restaurant involved was McDonald's, and by helping Ray Kroc acquire the first McDonald's restaurant, Ooms had a hand in creating an international icon.

While that might seem the likely pinnacle of most legal careers, Ooms always told friends that his patent and trademark work for Dairy Queen, Anheuser-Busch and Day-Brite Lighting - which allowed him to argue three times before the U.S. Supreme Court - were far bigger feathers in his cap.

Ooms, who practiced law over seven decades, died Friday at a Henderson nursing home following a four-month battle with leukemia. He was 82.

Services for the Southern Nevada resident of 11 years will be at 4 p.m. today at CornerStone Christian Fellowship, 5825 Eldora Ave. Arrangements are being handled by Palm Mortuary-Eastern. Ooms' body was donated to science.

"No question, Owen's greatest quality was his honesty," said financier, businessman and longtime friend Wolf Schanda. "You could really rely on him.

"The McDonald's franchise agreement he wrote was more a matter of good timing, but he was far more proud of having had the honor of arguing before the U.S. Supreme Court three times. Not many attorneys get to do that."

In 1954, one year after Dairy Queen hired Ooms as a patent attorney, Ooms met with Kroc, then a seller of restaurant supplies to Dairy Queen. In addition to writing the historic agreement for McDonald's, Ooms helped open the first McDonald's restaurant in Chicago in 1955.

Ooms' lone Supreme Court victory came in 1964, when he argued a patent infringement case for Day-Brite Lighting, an Illinois lighting fixture company accused of copying the design of a rival firm's lighting reflector.

In an opinion written by Justice Hugo Black, the Supreme Court held unanimously that when an object is unprotected by a patent or copyright, state law may not forbid others from copying it.

Ooms' other Supreme Court appearances came in 1962.

In one, he represented Dairy Queen in a trademark infringement case against a party that the company claimed had breached its contract to pay $150,000 for the exclusive use of the company trademark in Pennsylvania. He also represented Anheuser-Busch in a trademark case against Chemical Corp. of America.

Born Aug. 1, 1923, in Chicago, Ooms graduated from the University of Illinois School of Law in 1947 and became a longtime partner in the Chicago law firm of Ooms, Welsh & Bradway. He moved to Las Vegas in 1995.

Ooms is survived by his wife of 58 years, Marilyn Ooms; two sons, Douglas Ooms of Fairbanks, Alaska, and David Ooms of West Palm Beach, Fla.; a daughter, Laura Ooms of Gainesville, Fla.; and one grandson, David Ooms, of West Palm Beach, Fla.