Frank R. Kenison

Frank Rowe Kenison (November 1, 1907 – December 14, 1980) was a New Hampshire lawyer and judge who served as Attorney General of New Hampshire from 1940 to 1942, and on the New Hampshire Supreme Court from 1946 to 1977, serving as chief justice for 28 years, from 1952 to 1977. He then entered the practice of law in Conway, and served as the solicitor of Carroll County, New Hampshire, from 1935 to 1937. In 1942, Kenison took a leave of absence from the position to serve in the United States Navy during World War II. He endorsed his assistant, Ernest D. D'Amours, to succeed him, but the state council approved Governor Robert O. Blood's nominee, Stephen M. Wheeler, by a 3-2 vote. On February 29, 1952, Governor Sherman Adams nominated Kenison for elevation to chief justice, to succeed the retiring Chief Justice Francis Wayland Johnston. Kenison became "known nationally as an instructor of judges", and served as chairman of the Chief Justices of the United States. with whom he had three children. Following his retirement from the court in 1977, the courthouse was renamed the Frank Rowe Kenison Supreme Court Building.