John Joseph Keohane, 84, a longtime bond attorney died unexpectedly on Friday at his home in Celebration, Florida.
Keohane, who retired from Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe on Jan. 1, 2024, was described by colleagues as a deep thinker with an encyclopedic knowledge of New York public finance law and a great sense of humor.
"John was an intellectual bond lawyer," said Roger Davis, an Orrick partner, who was named to The Bond Buyer's Hall of Fame in 2022. "He thought deeply about the history and the context of the larger world of public finance."
He moved south, living in Louisiana, Georgia and eventually Florida, shifting from Orrick partner to senior counsel with the move away from the New York office. But he always considered himself a proud New Yorker, according to the obituary penned by his children.
After earning a bachelor's degree from St. Francis College in 1964, he went to work as a banker for the now-defunct Dollar Dry Dock Savings Bank, where he met his wife Dolleen-Day.
He ran unsuccessfully for a state Senate seat in the Bronx. The campaign caught the attention of the New York Republican party and resulted in a job with the state Legislature.
His work with the Legislature sparked an interest in the law. He attended night school at Fordham University earning a law degree in 1974.
After earning his degree, he worked for Roosevelt & Son, and then Hawkins, Delafield & Wood, before joining Orrick in 1987.
He was a key player in the creation of the Municipal Assistance Corp., which helped New York City recover after its fiscal crisis in the 1970s, Davis said.
When New York City defaulted on its loans; it was the first major default since The Great Depression, Davis said.
"New York City was frozen out of the bond market," said Eileen Heitzler, an Orrick partner, who was named to The Bond Buyer Hall of Fame this year. "MAC was a way to access the bond market. It's hard to imagine now, because New York City has solid credit ratings."
The headline in the New York Daily News then was: Ford to City: Drop Dead, because the Federal Reserve had said, no to a bailout, also referencing U.S. President Gerald Ford, she said.
When Keohane joined Orrick, it was with a large group from Hawkins, Delafield & Wood, Davis said. These lawyers were instrumental in giving Orrick, which opened its first office in the city in 1984, a real presence in New York public finance, said Davis, who co-chaired the firm's public finance practice for 40 years until he semi-retired in January 2021.
He was a thoughtful mentor, who always drew associates into conversations, so they would have a solid grounding in public finance law and understand the thinking, Heitzler said.
"He was one of my mentors," said Damon Pace, Orrick senior counsel, who joined the firm in 1998. "One of the things that struck me was the ease with which he would break down complex bond structures. He always wanted to be practical in how we got to the solution, not wanting it to be more complicated than it needed to be."
Keohane had the ability to put people at ease with his sense of humor and to make everyone feel like they were part of a larger purpose, his colleagues said.
"He was wonderful to work with," Davis said.
As Heitzler has delivered news of his passing, everyone said what a wonderful person he was, she said.
His sense of humor was well-documented in the obituary penned by his children, who described a practice he adopted when flying on his frequent business trips.
"He would, on his recurrent business trips, decide based on who boarded the plane if he would get a mention in the headline or article, should the plane crash: Fifth Avenue Attorney Among Dead," they
In addition to his work with MAC, he also worked on projects from the Delaware Memorial Gap Bridge to Battery Park City. He also helped create the Student Loan Fund of Idaho, which enabled the state to issue tax-exempt debt to offer low interest loans to college students, the attorneys said.
He was asked by the Carter White House to work in the Treasury Department, but declined, the obit said, "because he was confident at some point he would have to disagree with their plans and felt it was best to do so from the comfort of New York, right from the start, rather than down the hall from the Oval Office."
He also gained admittance to argue cases before the U.S. State Supreme Court, which Davis said makes him the only attorney in Orrick's public finance group to have that distinction.
He is survived by his wife, Dolleen-Day, and his children: Sean (Irena), Brendan, Padraic (Bess Fanning), Colin (Renée Robinson), Elizabeth (Tyler Burbridge), and Alison (Ann Fountain), as well as his grandchildren, Maisie Burbridge, Kent Keohane, Rory Burbridge, Oliver Keohane-Fountain, Luca Keohane-Fountain, Mary Burbridge, and Juniper Keohane.
A wake will be held on Monday from 5-8 p.m. at the Conrad and Thompson Funeral Home in Kissimmee, Florida. The funeral will be Tuesday at 11 a.m. at Corpus Christi Church in Celebration, Florida.
The family requests mourners donate to a charity of their choice in lieu of flowers.
