Presidents of the National Association of REALTORS® - 1912 - Edward S. Judd

At a  meeting in Duluth in 1907 that made real estate history, it was Edward Sanderson Judd who made the fruitful suggestion that a National Association of Real Estate Boards be formed. The Duluth meeting was called at the invitation of the Duluth Real Estate Board, and representatives were present from the real estate exchanges of St. Louis, Milwaukee, St. Paul, Minneapolis, Superior, Duluth and Chicago. In May of 1908, Mr. Judd, then president of the Chicago Real Estate Board, welcomed to his city the first national real estate convention, at which the National Association of Real Estate Exchanges (now the National Association of REALTORS®) was organized.

It was during his presidency that the Association, during the convention in Winnipeg, adopted its code of ethics, which after several revisions become the code to which every member must subscribe.

Mr. Judd was a graduate of Williams College in Massachusetts and was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1884 after studying at the Union College of Law. He practiced law from 1884-1887 as a member of the law firms of Judd & Whitehouse and Judd, Ritchie, Esher & Judd. He entered the real estate business in 1888 as manager of the loan department of E. A. Cummings & Co. In 1903 he founded his own realty firm, Edward S. Judd & Co. He was a member of the Chicago City Plan Commission, Chicago Underwriters' Association and Chicago Association of Commerce. Mr. Judd was a member of the Society of Colonial Wars.

Source: Presidents of the National Association of REALTORS®, (Chicago: NAR, 1980).

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IMAGES:  Top: 1912 President Edward S. Judd; Bottom: Judd caricatured in the April 1916 National Real Estate Journal.