BK Blast Archive

I sadly have to share that Robert S. Atkins, father of BK member Jennifer Atkins, passed away on Sunday, October 20, 2013, after a long battle with liver disease and many other ailments and complications.  He was surrounded by his family.  In the last two days, they were able to sing, pray together, and shower him with love.  

The funeral took place yesterday in Wilmette, Illinois.  Jennifer shares that the funeral was beautiful.  Jennifer and her brother as well nephews all spoke.  Jennifer's niece sang psalm 23 and her dad's wish, to have Chaconne played at his funeral, was played beautifully by a violinist who her dad had mentored many years ago in high school when she was a freshman and he was the concert master.

Jennifers mom (Patricia), brother (Norman), his wife (Angie) and their children (Zohar, Ariel, and Shira) along with Jennifer and Alvaro and their children, Paloma and Elia, will sit shiva in New York City, at the apartment of Norman and Angie Atkins, 645 West End Avenue, Apt 1A) on  Sunday, October 27 and would be honored by your company between 4pm and  +9pm with maariv at 7pm.

ABOUT ROBERT S. ATKINS

Robert Sheldon Atkins, 81, a long-time Chicago litigator and public servant who argued one case before the U.S. Supreme Court, died  October 20, 2013.  In the 1960s and early 1970s, he served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney and State of Illinois Assistant Attorney General, prosecuting white collar crime, price-fixing, and big business conspiracies.  After establishing and leading the state’s anti-trust division, the Chicago  Sun Times called him (at 5’8) “a little giant-killer.”  As a private litigator for three decades, Atkins worked with the Better Government Association, fighting corruption in Chicago and Illinois politics and government.  In 1982, he famously locked horns with Harvard  University Professor Arthur Miller in front of the U.S. Supreme Court.  Upon his retirement in recent years, Atkins taught constitutional law to elementary school students and presented himself as an inveterate letter-writer and gadfly in the Evanston community where he and his beloved wife, Patricia “Patty” Atkins made their home over the past half-century.  Son of Allen and Hattie Atkins, he grew up in Chicago, graduated from Senn High School, University of Wisconsin, and Northwestern University Law School.   As a prodigious teenage violinist, Atkins once won first prize on the Morris B. Sachs Amateur Hour (the Chicagoland “American Idol” of its time) and was the concertmaster of his high school orchestra.  After a hiatus, he performed various violin recitals on the North Shore for the past 30 years. In addition to his wife, Patricia, he is survived by two children, Norman Atkins (of New York City) and Jennifer Atkins (Montclair, NJ);  their spouses Angie Atkins and Alvaro Donado; sister, Barbara Ruhman (Chicago); and five grandchildren: Zohar Atkins (Oxford), Ariel Atkins (San Francisco), Shira Atkins (New York City) and Paloma and Elia Donado (Montclair). 

In lieu of flowers, donations can be made in honor of Robert Atkins to: Noble Network of Charter Schools (External Affairs Dept), 1 North State St., Floor 7-L, Chicago, IL 60602.