According to Malcolm G. King, he never seriously considered a legal career until his father suggested that he go to work in the family sawmill. At that point, he says, he ran for cover and after having consulted a career psychologist who thought he had some latent potential for the law he decided to enroll in law school at UBC rather than continue with an arts program - which he admits he would have preferred. However, several good friends, including Harry Bell-Irving and Bruce Boyd were enrolling at the same time so he thought - why not?
Malcolm entered law school in September of 1946, graduating on schedule in the spring of 1949 - the second class of law students to graduate from UBC. During the summers months of 1947 and 1948 he articled at Russell & DuMoulin at their offices at 850 West Hastings Street. Instead of articling in the summer of 1949 he travelled in England and Europe. He returned home in the fall, and after completing his articles at Russell & DuMoulin, was called to the bar in July of 1950.
According to Malcolm, articling was a much less structured process in those days than now. In fact his duties as an articled student combined those of valet and student. His principal, A.M. Russell, Q.C., was a corporate solicitor with an impressive array of clients and he involved Malcolm in many interesting files. However, he also expected Malcolm to perform other services such as ensuring that he always had an adequate supply of whisky and clean shirts from the laundry. He had, says Malcolm, what we would call today a rather "laid back" approach to the practice of law. Malcolm remembers one occasion on which Mr. Russell had returned to his office after a few days’ absence to find a pile of pink telephone message slips on his desk, some of which were dated weeks before. He looked at these and said "Malcolm, you would be amazed if you left things alone how much the passage of time would take care of most problems".
After completing articles and being called to the bar, Malcolm returned to England where he planned to spend the year travelling and, hopefully, enhancing his legal qualifications by working for a firm of solicitors in London, although, of course, he was not qualified as a solicitor there. He was interviewed by a few firms who, he says, were delighted to take him. Unfortunately, it quickly became clear that rather than pay him a salary, the firms were expecting him to pay them for the privilege of articling with them. Malcolm’s financial circumstances did not allow him to accept their kind proposals so he spent the winter working for a firm of timber importers.
On his return to Vancouver late in the fall of 1951, Malcolm remained unemployed for about 6 months - a period he describes as one of the happiest of his life. Just as his parents were about to evict him from the family home, he received a telephone call from E.M.C. McClorg of Davis & Company who said that he had heard that Malcolm was looking for work (not true, he says). Mr. McClorg’s client, Canadian Bechtel Limited, the company which had the contract to build the Trans Mountain oil pipe line, required a solicitor in Kamloops to search the titles to all properties from the Yellowhead Pass to Hope through which the proposed pipe line would pass. Not only was the salary offered very generous but all expenses including room and board would be paid. Much to his parents’ relief, Malcolm accepted and spent the next 8 months in Kamloops and Vancouver working for Canadian Bechtel Limited.
That job terminated when all of the right of way for the pipeline had been acquired. Almost immediately, however, a call came from Russell & DuMoulin. They needed a junior solicitor and was Malcolm available? And so Malcolm returned to the firm where he had articled. In fact, he says, some of the files which he had been handling before he left in the fall of 1950 were handed back to him three years later in about the same state as he had left them. From 1953 to 1956 Malcolm worked there happily as a solicitor in corporate law and, he says if he had any specialty, it was in forestry law. In September of 1956 he married and Malcolm and his bride went on a wedding trip to Europe. On reaching London at the end of our tour and checking in with B.C. House he found a message for him to call his old friend and classmate Bruce Boyd.
Bruce was the son of Boyd, C.C.J., one of the three County Court Judges in Vancouver at the time. After Malcolm and Bruce left law school, Bruce completed his articles with Tommy Dohm and joined him in partnership. Sam Toy, who had also articled at Russell & DuMoulin, had joined them a short time before. Malcolm returned Bruce's call to learn that Bruce and Sam had decided to strike out on their own in early 1957 and they wondered if Malcolm was interested in joining them. Malcolm told Bruce that it sounded like a great idea and that he would let him know for sure after he returned home in about a week's time. Malcolm did, after all, want to check with the firm which had just allowed him a generous leave of absence to take his extended trip. He spoke on his return with Mr. Russell who said "Go for it - I would do the same thing in your shoes".
So in early 1957 the firm of Boyd King & Toy was formed.. They occupied premises on the 6th floor of the old Birks’ building at Georgia and Granville which consisted of an outer office where their secretary and Sam sat, an inner windowless office where Malcolm sat and an outer office for Bruce - a total of about 560 square feet. Bruce and Sam had clients from the Dohm/Boyd practice and a few clients followed Malcolm.
While the small space contributed to their low overhead it also had its disadvantages. One of Sam's clients was a logger from the Fraser Valley by the name of Gail Watson Beach who was stone deaf and, says Malcolm, spoke with a very loud voice. Sam, of course, had to respond at similar volume. When Mr. Beach visited the offices, which he did frequently because he was a litigious man, the rest of the office had to vacate for coffee.
The location had advantages as well. It was within a block of the Land Title Office and the County Court Registry, the predecessor of our present Personal Property Registry where chattel mortgages and conditional sales agreements were registered. Malcolm’s first meeting with his long-standing client, Torben Kristiansen, occurred when Torben and his partner at the time arrived at the offices unannounced to say that they had just purchased an art gallery, the "Art Emporium" which was across the street in the old Lyric theatre building. After delivering a cheque to the owner in a fairly substantial amount as a down payment, it occurred to Torben that he would be wise to determine that the inventory was clear of encumbrances. While he and his partner remained in the office, Malcolm went to the County Court Registry and, after searching, found that the inventory was encumbered many times over. Torben was able to stop payment on the cheque and the whole deal was renegotiated. Thus, says Malcolm, one solicitor client relationship was established.
In the spring of 1959 Sam and Malcolm lost Bruce to Hodgkin's disease. They carried on in the Birks’ building for another few years. Malcolm recalls that Sam became increasingly busy with counsel work while Malcolm minded the shop with a largely commercial and corporate practice. His clients included some smaller forestry companies and Garibaldi Lifts Ltd., the company which built the first ski lifts on Whistler mountain.
In the mid 1960's Malcolm and Sam moved to 925 West Georgia Street - the old Medical Dental Building - where Tony Wooster joined them in practice as an associate. The three of them continued to practice until 1974 when Sam was appointed to the Supreme Court Bench. At the same time, Dave Campbell, who was practising in partnership with Drew Pratt on the floor above them, was appointed to the County Court Bench leaving Mr. Pratt, a senior practitioner, in need of some assistance to look after his many estates and his principal client, the Burlington Northern Railroad. Malcolm, Drew and Tony therefore joined forces as Pratt King and Wooster and the practice became busier.
There was a great deal of work for the railroad for which, Malcolm recalls, Mr. Pratt was paid a retainer of $600 a month - a sum which had been unchanged for many years. The three of them considered this inadequate so Mr. Pratt and Malcolm drove to Seattle to seek an increase in their remuneration. They returned still on a retainer basis but at $1200 a month which continued until the railroad company reorganized and increased the size of its in-house counsel staff, at which point the firm began to act on a fee for service basis. One of the company's requirements for the retainer was that, as the railroad's solicitors in British Columbia, the firm hook into the railroad's own telephone network. Malcolm and Mr. Pratt each had red telephones on their desks in addition to their standard telephone company equipment. These allowed them to contact quickly the various officers of the railroad to whom they reported and from whom they took instructions. But they also allowed all railway employees including lineman, station masters and switching men along the right of way to contact the firm. Malcolm recalls receiving on several occasions telephone calls from railway employees along the right of way in eastern Washington, Idaho, Montana or North Dakota asking for advice on various aspects of Canadian law.
Unfortunately, Malcolm’s association with Mr. Pratt lasted slightly less than a year when he died at the age of 85. Malcolm and Tony were wondering what they would do with all of the railway and other files when, on November 11, 1975, Harry Bell-Irving appeared unexpectedly at Malcolm’s front door on Balfour Street and asked if Tony and Malcolm would be interested in joining Douglas Symes & Brissenden. The rest, says Malcolm, is history.