Albert W. Northrop: "Doomed" to a Connection with UMUC

By Chip Cassano

Northrop's yearbook photo, circa 1966.

Albert W. Northrop, chief Orphans' Court judge for Prince George's County, Maryland, came to UMUC's Munich Campus in 1965. Like most students, he was from a military family—his father was a chaplain in the Air Force, stationed in Tripoli, Libya—but unlike most students, more than 35 years later, UMUC is still an everyday part of Northrop's life.

It all began with what some of Northrop's friends have likened, only half jokingly, to a religious experience.

"Those were just two absolutely delightful years [in Munich]," Northrop said. "The class sizes were relatively small, and we had some fascinating professors. The cultural experience was great. And I had the good fortune to be the chairman of the student government and a dormitory prefect. I really can't say enough good things about the whole experience."

After two years—the Munich Campus didn't offer four-year degrees—Northrop returned to the United States and finished his undergraduate studies at the University of Maryland, College Park. From there, he went on to earn a law degree from University of Maryland School of Law in Baltimore and began to practice law.

But he never really lost touch with UMUC. He had established friendships that would last a lifetime, and he kept in touch with a number of his classmates—and more than a few teachers and administrators, as well. He became acquainted with Ray Ehrensberger, then president of UMUC, and he was close friends with the son-in-law of Wilson Elkins (Elkins was president of University of Maryland, College Park, from 1954 through 1978; when he came to visit the Munich Campus in the 1960s, Northrop, as chair of the student government, was called to escort him around campus).

"To this day, [Elkins' son-in-law] is my best friend," Northrop said. "We'll probably have dinner and play bridge this weekend. I guess it's just another of those funny little twists."

But more "funny little twists" were yet to come. Northrop's friends at UMUC encouraged him to serve on the Alumni Association board, and he agreed, bringing him into more regular contact with the school. Around the same time, he accepted a judgeship in Maryland's Orphans' Court, the probate court for the state. Drawing on his expertise, he wrote a law book, Decedents' Estates in Maryland, and although he didn't know it, UMUC's paralegal program adopted it as a textbook.

"I think they'd used it for a year or so," Northrop said, "and one day they called me and said, 'We're using your book; would you like to teach the course?' And I said, 'Well, OK.'"

Northrop has been teaching for UMUC ever since, and it seems his ties to the school—direct and indirect—only grow stronger. For example, one of his friends from Munich, Michael P. Whalen, is now an associate judge in Prince George's County's circuit court, and the two maintain a close friendship.

Sometimes, Northrop said, it just seems like fate.

Albert Northrop, right, with friends, in Munich.

At an informal meeting of some members of the Alumni Association several years ago, someone brought out a photo from UMUC's archives and showed it to Northrop.

"I said, 'Well, I'm certainly familiar with that picture,'" Northrop said. "'That's my freshman dorm room suite, and that's me in the picture; in fact, I took the picture with the camera on a time delay, set on a tripod, and we published it in the yearbook, and I worked on the yearbook.' It was just one of these little coincidences, but sometimes they just catch you off guard.

"It's like I'm doomed to this tie with UMUC," he said, laughing, "which, you know, is not a bad thing at all."