Dissolved 1996 | ||
Company type Limited Liability Partnership | ||
Holden Day Wilson LLP was a Canadian law firm. When it closed in 1996, it was the largest law firm failure in Canadian history.
History
The firm was founded in the early 20th Century as Day, Wilson, led by founding partner Jimmy Day's expertise in the incorporation of mining companies. In 1990, the firm merged with the prominent firm of Holden, Murdoch and renamed itself Holden Day Wilson. In 1993, one of its partners, Garry Hoy, was killed after accidentally throwing himself through a glass window of its downtown Toronto-Dominion Centre office in a playful attempt to demonstrate the strength of the window. The shock of losing one of its most successful lawyers was a contributing factor in the firm's decline and fall, and the firm lost nearly 30 lawyers in the following three years. In 1996, the firm closed for good. Until the closing of Goodman and Carr in 2007, it was the largest law firm failure in Canadian history.