J. Stanley Mullin; Law Firm Co-Founder, Sportsman

J. Stanley Mullin, one of the founding partners of the Los Angeles-based law firm Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton and a versatile sportsman, has died. He was 93.

Mullin died Monday in Los Angeles, his firm announced.

A transactional business attorney, Mullin specialized in corporate law, real estate and trust and estate planning. One of his major clients was the Coca-Cola Bottling Co. of Los Angeles, which helped him move his law firm toward representing management in labor relations.

Born in Los Angeles and educated at Stanford University and Harvard Law School, Mullin began his career as a law clerk at what was then Mathes & Sheppard. He became a name partner in 1945 when the firm became Sheppard, Mullin & Richter, and in 1958, along with James C. Sheppard, George R. Richter Jr. and Gordon Hampton, he formed the current Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton.

Throughout his career with the growing firm, Mullin stressed the need for trust among partners.

“I learned that law firms are a very delicate piece of porcelain,” he said in 1997. “They can break and they do break. So much care and attention has to be had at all times to be sure that it’s a cooperative, friendly and trusting group. Secondly, there must be the effort to put out the best legal product. Otherwise, people will not buy your services.”

In legal circles, Mullin served as president of the Chancery Club, a trustee of the Los Angeles County Bar Assn. and chairman of the real property, probate and trust law section of the American Bar Assn.

He was also a commissioner of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.

Mullin also served as president of the private California Club in 1978, a tense period of protests targeting the club’s policy against membership for women and minorities. That policy has since been changed.

After hours, Mullin was an indefatigable sportsman, mastering horseback riding, skiing, sports car racing and rowing.

He had a long association with the Olympics, competing in trials for equestrian jumping for the 1932 games and serving on the Organizing Committee for the 1960 Winter Olympics at Squaw Valley, Calif.

An avid competitive skier, he hiked up California’s snow-covered mountains in the 1930s before the advent of ski lifts. He was a founding member of Southern Skis and the California Ski Assn. and for 16 years was a U.S. delegate to the International Ski Federation. In 1973, he was inducted into the National Ski Hall of Fame at Ishpeming, Mich., for his contributions to the improvement of competition in the United States.

In his 40s, Mullin raced sports cars in Monterey, Palm Springs and Santa Barbara. He became the first president of the California Sports Car Club, and at age 74 took a spin around Riverside International Raceway in his 1961 Lotus 19. He declined to drive it in the 1982 Times Historic Automobile Race, however, telling the Times: “I’m too tall and I’m too slow. It would be a shame to have someone drive it who is not quite up to snuff.”

For the last 20 years of his life, Mullin practiced a sport he first encountered as a Harvard student on Boston’s Charles River--sculling. He founded the rowing section of the California Yacht Club and this year was recognized by the California Open Water Rowing Assn. for his contributions to the sport.

He was a Navy lieutenant during World War II, serving aboard a destroyer that participated in the Normandy invasion and in the battles of Okinawa and Iwo Jima.

Mullin is survived by two daughters, Caitlin Mullin and Patricia Mullin Jakle; two sons, Michael and J. Stanley Mullin Jr.; and seven grandchildren.

A memorial service is scheduled for 10 a.m. Saturday at Wilshire United Methodist Church, 711 S. Plymouth Blvd.

The family has asked that any memorial donations be made to St. John’s Hospital in Santa Monica; to Harvard Law School’s James C. Sheppard Memorial Fund, which Mullin helped create; or to a charity of the donor’s choice.