Edmund Spencer Purves

1928 - 2020
Edmund Spencer Purves, an attorney and long time resident of the New York metropolitan area (Larchmont and later in Riverdale), died September 24th. He is the son of Edmund Randolph Purves and Mary Carroll Spencer Purves of Philadelphia. His wife of 58 years, Elizabeth Ewing Purves, died in June, 2015. He is survived by his daughter, Anna Purves and his son, Michael Purves, both of New York and his six grand children: Jonathan and Jeremy Neroulias; and Juliane, Alexander, Rafael, and Lucia Purves. He is also survived by his son-in -law, Vasilios Neroulias and his daughter-in-law, Lucia Regales.

He was born on January 6th, 1928 in Media, Pennsylvania, and attended the Haverford School. He received a BA from Harvard and later an LL.D. from Harvard Law. In between he enlisted in the Army, serving in the reconstruction of Germany and Italy in the aftermath of World War II, as 1st lieutenant. Following law school, he and his wife moved to New York City and subsequently Larchmont, N.Y.. His career took him to law firms in Boston and New York, at the Coats and Clark Thread Co. as in-house counsel, and the Financial Accounting Foundation as Executive Director until settling into a private practice in Larchmont. His greatest interest in the law was in mediation and solving problems amicably for his clients.
Mr. Purves became fluent in German and Italian, and loved history and art. Armed with only a basic camera from the 1950's he became a passionate and innovative photographer. He was named an honorary citizen of Wurzburg, Germany, in 2004 for his evocative photographs of the city's ruins which were taken while stationed there in the Army.

A service will take place on October 5th, 2020 at 5 p.m. EST. If you would like to attend by zoom, please contact Michael Purves at mpurves@tallbackencapital.com.