The Firm – A Biography of Webber Wentzel Bowens by Mike Nicol

The Firm – A Biography of Webber Wentzel Bowens is Mike Nicol’s history of one of South Africa’s longest-established legal practices. It was first published in South Africa by Random House in 2006, in paperback.

The story begins with the diamond and gold discoveries that drew people from all over the world to Kimberley and Johannesburg. Among them were lawyers such as Edward Solomon, Henry Charles Hull, J.C. Haarhoff, Charles Augustus Wentzel and Eliot St Maurice Hutchinson, whose practices grew into the firms that later merged as Webber Wentzel Bowens.

The Firm follows these men as legal advisers to the Randlords and the mining houses. Hull and Solomon were among the Jameson Raiders, and the firm and its clients played a real part in shaping early Johannesburg.

The later chapters cover the second half of the twentieth century, when the practice moved from a conservative partnership towards a more diverse, modern firm. Webber Wentzel and Bowens were among the first to appoint women as partners. Nicol also describes two near collapses of Webber Wentzel, and how the partners held it together.

Mike Nicol is a Cape Town journalist and novelist whose non-fiction includes A Good-Looking Corpse, his history of Drum magazine. The Firm will appeal to lawyers, readers of Johannesburg and Witwatersrand history, and anyone interested in South African business history. The Firm is also a good companion to books on the Randlords and the Jameson Raid.

Condition – Very Good

A very good copy of this 2006 paperback. The covers show light general wear, with slight peeling to the cover surface near the spine at the bottom, which is hardly noticeable. There is a small crease at the top edge of the back cover. The spine is intact and the binding is firm. Internally the pages are clean and unmarked.