Santa Clara University

Class Notes Profile

Patents Keep Him Busy

Howard Peters ’78 found his law field through his work in chemistry.

Howard Peters ’78 hates to sit still. From co-inventing seven patents, to earning a law degree while working full-time and raising a family, to volunteering for youth science programs, Peters likes to be perpetually busy.

“I have a very low threshold for boredom,” Peters says. “Every minute I’m awake, I’m doing something.” Perhaps, sometime during his childhood on a Pennsylvania farm, someone told him the old adage about idle hands. His father was a coal miner/farmer and gave Peters one of his first tastes of science by making slurry explosives (motor oil and ammonium nitrate fertilizer) to blast out stumps or ice jams in the nearby stream. This helped to spark one of his life-long loves: chemistry.

Peters studied chemistry at Geneva College, and the summer after he graduated he went to work for Gulf Oil where he co-authored three patents. He was 21 years old.

“I enjoyed the work,” he says. “I felt I was good at it, but I was always open to something else.” That something else arrived when he decided he wanted more than a bachelor’s degree and someone told him about Stanford University. “When they told me it was in California, I said, ‘Great. I’ll go.’”

After earning his Ph.D. from Stanford, he got his first job at Dow Chemical Company, where he led research projects on volatile anesthetics, herbicides, and high explosives, among other things. Peters was able to spend four months working in the patent department at Dow, and says he was fascinated by it.

“It was unusual for us science types, but I’d always liked to write,” he says. “Here was this process where you take laboratory research, write about it, then make it property.” Peters was so fascinated by the process that he decided to enroll in night school classes at SCU School of Law even though he was still working full-time in explosives at SRI International in Menlo Park.

“I look back now, and I feel so fortunate I had someone who was supportive,” Peters says of his wife, Sally, who he met in a chem lab at Geneva College in 1962. “In some of my darker times, I wonder what would have happened if I had married someone else.”

Peters faced many challenges in the six years he spent earning his law degree at SCU, but the most difficult was when, in February of 1976, he injured his back and had to have two discs removed. Sitting in class was impossible, so his friends took notes for him and brought them to the hospital. When it came time to take his exams, Peters could stand or lie down, but he couldn’t sit, so his professors allowed him to dictate his answers.

“I couldn’t have continued with law school if they hadn’t allowed me to do that,” he says. “I’ve done my part to repay them by continuing to practice law for the last 27 years.”

He began practicing law with Syntex, a Palo Alto pharmaceutical company, in 1980. He says that his work at Syntex taught him that patents are important because they can make or destroy companies. After four years, Peters decided to go into private practice. He became a partner at Phillips, Moore, Lempio & Finley, where he filed and prosecuted more than 300 patent applications. Then, in August of 1996, he helped found the boutique intellectual property firm Peters, Verny, Jones & Biksa, LLP (now Peters, Verny, Jones, Schmitt & Aston LLP).

Peters says he enjoys patent work because every experiment is new, so he doesn’t get bored. At least, not too bored. He still finds time for an array of activities, such as his work with the American Chemical Society (ACS) where he participates in many different ways. Currently, he serves on the national board of directors and gives lectures about some of his favorite subjects, like chocolate.

According to Peters, his experiences at SCU School of Law have been vital in creating and enjoying this full life.

“SCU does a wonderful job of weaving the fabric you need for life,” he says. “They gave me the tools to build the bridge that I walk on every day.”

KERI MODRALL