Judge “Burl” McGuire was born in the rural Genesee County town of Oakfield, New York in 1935. (He half-jokingly would say “not berr-ill. That’s a girl’s name. Burl, as in Burl Ives.”) His father was a factory manager at US Gypsum in Oakfield: the company’s gypsum mines lay under the agricultural fields for miles in all directions. After graduation from Oakfield-Alabama Central High School, he completed a six-year program of business and law at what was then the University of Buffalo (now the State University of New York at Buffalo.) With degrees in both law and management, he set out in 1959 upon a management training program at Harrison Radiator Corporation in Lockport New York, the primary supplier of radiators and air conditioners to General Motors, employing more than 1000 workers. But Burl listened to the call of the law and associated with the Buffalo law firm of Cox Barrell until he received an important invitation in 1962. It was to interview with District Judge John Oliver Henderson for the position of his Confidential Law Clerk. (Burl had been recommended by the Judge’s outgoing law clerk, one of his classmates at UB law.) He was hired and sat at Judge Henderson’s elbow for six years.

In 1968, the-then “referee in bankruptcy” (as they were called until a rules change in 1973) retired, and by-then Chief District Judge Henderson and District Judges Harold Burke and John Curtin appointed Burl to that position for the statutory six-year term. In due course Judge McGuire was appointed by the District Court for another six years under the 1898 Bankruptcy Act, and then was appointed by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals for 14 years under the Bankruptcy Reform Act of 1978.

Judge McGuire was a cornerstone of the four major pillars of the Bankruptcy Court in the Western District of New York. One was developing a program of “wage earner plans” in the district. At the time of his appointment as a referee, non-business bankruptcy cases under the Bankruptcy Act of 1898 consisted of “straight bankruptcy cases” which were Chapter VII of the statute, and “wage earner plans” which were Chapter XIII. Wage earner plans assured some payment to creditors and enabled some debtors to reestablish their financial foundations. In an effort to encourage the use of wage earner plans, Judge McGuire launched an educational program for both attorneys and creditors and appointed a “standing trustee” to handle those Chapter XIII cases. This led to a significant increase in these filings, and a concomitant increase in payments to creditors. The Chapter 13 Trustees in the District today pay out to creditors well more than $12,000,000 annually.

Second, along with his colleagues, Judges Edward D. Hayes, and John W. Creahan, he “brought the court to the people” to benefit debtors and creditors alike. Throughout his tenure, he sat monthly in Chautauqua County (first at Jamestown and Dunkirk, New York, and then at Mayville) and Cattaraugus County (at Olean, New York).

Third, his service on various national committees enabled him to bring an early focus on the district for automation efforts by policymakers in Washington. The Court was chosen as one of only three districts to “pilot” the program called “BANCAP,” which, in turn enabled the Court to become an early site for CM/ECF, now in use in all bankruptcy and district courts.

And fourth, together with Judges Hayes and Creahan, he led the court from the era of the 1898 Bankruptcy Act to that of the 1978 Bankruptcy Code. But not just locally. Judge McGuire was an advocate nationally for the bankruptcy courts and had testified before a congressional committee researching bankruptcy reforms. He was appointed twice by Chief Justice Warren Burger to the United States Supreme Court’s Advisory Committee on Bankruptcy Rules. He was also appointed by Chief Justice Burger to the Judicial Conference Committee on Judicial Improvements and was appointed twice more to the Committee by Chief Justice William Rehnquist. At the Circuit Court level, he was appointed to the library, automation and bankruptcy committees. Judge McGuire represented the bankruptcy judges of the Second Circuit for eight years on the Board of Governors of the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges and served as its president from 1984-1985.

Judge McGuire’s chambers in Buffalo were a morning “coffee hours” gathering space for certain “denizens” of the courthouse in the 1980s and 1990s. Most notable of the attendees were District Judge Curtin, Bankruptcy Judge Creahan and Magistrate Judge Edmund Maxwell. As a child during World War II, Judge McGuire had built models of fighter planes, and now three highly-decorated combat pilots of several of those aircraft gathered frequently in his small office. Of course, the discussions ranged far beyond warplanes. Those morning gatherings were priceless for Judge McGuire.

Among his notable cases were Boss-Linco Lines, Inc., Hard Manufacturing and Richardson Yachts. In 1993, he was inducted into the American College of Bankruptcy in a ceremony held at the United States Supreme Court, and he also received the University at Buffalo Law Alumni Association’s Distinguished Alumni Award.

Judge McGuire and his wife Prudence (“Prudy”) were married for 61 years. She is a retired nurse-supervisor of the operating room at Kenmore Mercy Hospital in Buffalo. They retired to Florida in 1993. Judge McGuire succumbed to injuries from a car accident in 2020, survived by his devoted wife.

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This memorial was prepared with the assistance and contributions of Hon. Michael J. Kaplan, Hon. Carl L. Bucki, Lisa Beaser, Mary Grace Bessinger, Barbara Ridall, and Cory Sandor.