NOTED FINANCE ATTORNEY C. WILLIS RITTER
COMMITS $5-MILLION GIFT TO U.VA. LAW SCHOOL 

	CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va., Oct. 6 -- C. Willis Ritter, a noted
Washington, D.C. finance attorney, has made a long-term commitment
of $5 million to the University of Virginia School of Law by naming
the Law School Foundation the irrevocable beneficiary of his
retirement plans.  The gift, of which $2.25 million will be applied
to the University's $700-million capital campaign, was announced at
today's Board of Visitors meeting launching the campaign.
	Ritter, a 1965 graduate of the School of Law, created the
Mary Claiborne and Roy H. Ritter Awards in honor of his parents
several years ago, and the new gift will endow an expanded awards
program in the law school.  The recipients of the highly esteemed
Ritter Awards, rising third-year law students, are nominated by
students, faculty and staff and selected on the basis of honor,
character and integrity.  Mary Claiborne Ritter was among the first
women to practice law in Virginia, having studied to pass the bar on
her own.
	Willis Ritter, a senior partner in the firm of Ritter
Eichner & Norris, one of the nation's top-ranked counsel to
underwriters for long-term municipal bond issues, was a member of
the Virginia Law Review editorial board while at U.Va.  He clerked
for a federal judge and was active in the civil rights movement
before entering the field of public finance.
	In the early 1980s Ritter helped develop zero-coupon bonds
and helped found the National Association of Bond Lawyers.  He is a
recipient of the ABA prize for excellence in taxation law, and this
year was elected to the American College of Bond Counsel, an honor
limited to only 60 practitioners in the field.
	Ritter said he believes Virginia is the finest law school in
the country "for its combination of academic excellence, collegial
approach to law, and the quality and character of its graduates."

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October 6, 1995