Robert A G Monks

Robert A.G. Monks, a lawyer and businessman from a prominent Massachusetts family who unsuccessfully ran for the U.S. Senate three times but found a calling in his 40s as an influential defender of shareholder rights, died on April 29 2025 at his home in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. He was 91. By age 40 Monks had worked his way up to partner at the Goodwin Procter law firm in Boston, amassed a fortune running a regional oil and coal firm and other businesses, and made the first of three unsuccessful runs for U.S. senator in Maine. In 1985, Monks, with Nell Minow, founded Institutional Shareholder Services, or ISS, which advises investors on how to vote on such matters as elections of directors, compensation policies and shareholder proposals. ISS isnow majority-owned by Deutsche Börse of Germany. After graduating from St. Paul’s School in Concord, N.H., Monks went to Harvard, earning an undergraduate degree in history in 1954. He had stood out as a 6-foot-6 rower for the varsity crew and was awarded a Phi Beta Kappa key. He later rowed for the University of Cambridge in England, where he also studied history as a Fiske scholar. In 1954, he married Millicent Sprague, known as Milly, a descendant of the Carnegie steel family. In addition to his son, Monks is survived by a daughter, Melinda Monks; three grandchildren; and six great-grandchildren