Real estate attorney's handwritten will gives $800K to humane society for cat care
A California real estate lawyer who called himself “Cat Daddy” has left this world a far better place as far as local felines are concerned.
Officials at the Marin Humane Society were overjoyed to learn that Brian Russell Kirchoff had given the group’s cat-care fund nearly $800,000 in a handwritten will, reports the Marin Independent Journal.
Kirchoff, who died in April 2013 of a heart attack at age 63, also provided handsomely for his own two pet cats. Chelsea and Tarka are living at a Santa Rosa animal sanctuary with a $20,000 fund to cover their care.
After graduating from McGeorge School of Law in 1979, Kirchoff worked as a staff attorney for Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher and later served as regional counsel of the Trust for Public Land in San Francisco, according to a death notice in the Marin Independent Journal. He was an only child and a bachelor.
A world traveler and a radio buff, he gave his collection of Asian art to staff at a sushi restaurant at which he was a regular, and bequeathed his radio equipment to a local amateur society, the newspaper notes.
A memorial celebration was held in May at a pizza parlor that Kirchoff frequented, and those who wished to make a donation in his memory were urged to give to the humane society’s cat-care fund.
If not a record, Kirchoff’s gift to the fund was certainly one of the highest amounts it has received in years, said John Reese, the humane society’s chief operating officer. “We are thrilled,” he told the newspaper.
