Soft-spoken and efficient, Judge Terri Harder of Minden provided a calm and stable courtroom for attorneys to operate in for nearly 25 years. Harder, 65, will be retiring her judgeship over district court for the 10th Judicial District on Friday. Counties in the 10th Judicial District include Adams, Clay, Franklin, Harlan, Kearney, Nuckolls, Phelps and Webster.
Lucinda Glen, a lawyer with Hastings law firm Bockstadter & Glen Law, LLC, was practicing law in 1999 when Harder was appointed to the bench. “She was very quiet but started making some quiet improvements to the way we did things,” Glen said. “She has always been extremely efficient.
” Harder was appointed by Gov. Mike Johanns on July 26, 1999, and was sworn into office on Sept. 10, 1999.
Area voters retained her in that position from that time forward, with the most recent election in 2020. Becoming a judge was something Harder had in mind for a long time, she said, leading her to apply for the position when it opened. She felt she had the characteristics needed to serve the district well.
“You need to have some academic ability to read the law and interpret the law, but I think that the biggest thing that a judge probably needs is common sense,” she said. “And I think that I have a good deal of common sense to use in the job and hopefully have used that in the job.” Harder attended Kearney State College and graduated from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1981.
She received her degree from the Univ.