Background
Hardy was born in Corsicana in Navarro County southeast of Dallas to George Hardy, Senior (1859-1947), and the former Llewella "Lula" Garlick (1866-1937).
Hardy was born in Corsicana in Navarro County southeast of Dallas to George Hardy, Senior (1859-1947), and the former Llewella "Lula" Garlick (1866-1937).
Hardy graduated in 1917 from the former Shreveport High School. He thereafter attended Virginia Military Institute in Lexington, Virginia, from which he graduated in 1920 after a hiatus for service in the United States Army during World War I. He studied for two years at Louisiana State University Law Center in Baton Rouge and was admitted in 1922 to the Louisiana Bar Association.
He moved to Shreveport when he was seven years of age. He had a sister, Greenwood Hardy Brinkmann (1892-1986), the wife of Francis Charles Brinkmann, Junior. (1890-1967), of Shreveport.
Hardy first practiced law in Shreveport with his father.
In 1932, upon his election at the age of thirty-two, Hardy served a single two-year term as mayor of Shreveport, which then operated under the city commission government. In 1943, Governor Sam H. Jones, appointed Hardy to the circuit court of appeals, to which he was later twice elected.
At the time of his death, Hardy was the presiding judge of the appeal court. He wrote the draft copy of Uniform Rules of the Courts of Appeal and was a president of the Conference of Judges of Louisiana.
He wrote many articles published in legal journals and was known as well for his social commentary.
In 1964, in a speech before the Shreveport Bar Association, he warned against "extremist" individuals and groups who would thwart the processes of law and endanger the well-being of the nation. Another circuit court judge, James East. Bolin of Webster Parish, was known for similar social commentary at the time. Bolin"s 1969 speech "The Spirit of Rebellion" was critical of demonstrators during the Vietnam War who undermined the American military personnel.
Fred West. Jones, Junior., a district judge who later joined the circuit court, voiced similar remarks at public forums.
In 1966, he was appointed to the state Rhodes Scholarship Selection Committee and service ed until his death the next year as the committee chairman. Hardy died of a brief illness at the age of sixty-seven and is interred at Forest Park East Cemetery in Shreveport.
In 1964, Judge Hardy was named an honorary member of the national law fraternity, the Order of the Coif. Hardy was a member of the Kings Highway Christian Church in Shreveport and was active with the Boy Scouts of America and the American Legion.
