Cultural leaders are mourning the loss of one of the county's most generous and dedicated supporters of the arts.

Trial lawyer Robert M. Montgomery Jr. of Palm Beach — known for his honey-smooth Alabama drawl, his leading role in securing an $11.3 billion settlement for Florida from Big Tobacco, and for a decades-long contribution to the area's cultural scene — died Sunday at 78 at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

Mr. Montgomery was one of the founders of the Kravis Center for the Performing Arts and a major benefactor of the Palm Beach Opera and the Armory Art Center.

Jim Beasley, a business litigation attorney and former chairman of the Palm Beach Opera, said the resolve and financial backing of Mr. Montgomery and his wife, Mary, played a huge part in taking the opera from performances at the former West Palm Beach Auditorium (aka the Leaky Teepee) to the Kravis Center.

A Kravis Center founder

Mr. Montgomery helped found the modern, multi-stage Kravis Center to give the opera a place to perform, Beasley said.

"Bob and Mary were the primary source of support and leadership for the opera for many, many years," he said.

Before the Kravis opened in 1992, the Palm Beach Opera performed at the West Palm Beach Auditorium — with a curtain cutting across the space to divide it. The acoustics were less than ideal, Beasley said.

"It was almost preposterous that you'd think of creating a major opera company from that kind of beginning," Beasley said. "It was Bob and Mary's dedication, vision and financial support that made it possible. They had lots of help, but they were the essential ingredient."

George Michel, of Palm Beach, worked with Mr. Montgomery for many years raising funds for the Kravis and the opera. Mr. Montgomery stepped down as chairman of the Palm Beach Opera in mid-2005 after 22 years of service; he remained on its board.

"He was very broad in his reach," Michel said in reference to Mr. Montgomery's work with numerous charitable organizations. "He was a powerhouse. When Bob put his mind to it, things happened."

Judy Mitchell, CEO of the Kravis Center, said Mr. Montgomery was a leader and advocate for "all facets of the arts" in the community.

"He was dealing with not only the Kravis Center but with every art form, every discipline, from music, dance, drama, visual arts, his support and commitment to the Armory (Art Center) and the opera. His real passion was for the opera," Mitchell said.

Mr. Montgomery was pushed from the vice chairmanship of the Kravis in 1999 due to tension resulting from his unending campaign to secure more peak-season slots for the opera. The opera had wanted more time for performances and rehearsals at the Kravis for years.

Building plans for an opera complex were dropped in 2001 because the organization was not receiving enough donations to justify the project.

"He always demonstrated such strong passion for those things he believed in," Mitchell said. "He's definitely going to be missed by everyone in the community."

The Armory Art Center

Mr. Montgomery's philanthropy helped transform the former National Guard Armory building in West Palm Beach's Howard Park into a nonprofit art school in 1987. Mr. Montgomery plowed more than $2 million into the Armory Art Center to keep it afloat and build a 10,000-square-foot addition.

More than 20 years after its founding, the school named for the Montgomerys is a flourishing and respected arts institution, executive director Jesus De Las Salas said.

"Bob has contributed so much, not only to the Armory, but to our entire community, and we will all miss him," De Las Salas said in a written statement.

Linda Silpe, chairwoman of the Armory board of directors, called Mr. Montgomery's death sad news.

"He was very generous with his time and resources," Silpe said. "Bob has never interfered, but he was always just a phone call away."

Silpe said she last saw Mr. Montgomery in the spring at a social event benefiting the Armory.

"He was looking good and feeling wonderful," she said. "He was strong, very strong, very handsome. He was lively and looked fine at the party."

Rena Blades, president of the Palm Beach County Cultural Council, said her organization worked with the Montgomerys to save the Armory building from demolition and develop it as an art school and gallery. Mr. Montgomery was chairman of the council from 1984-1986. He continued to be an adviser and donor after he left the board.

"I found Bob to be incredibly intelligent, with fabulous intuition about the right things to do about an organization, politically astute and incredibly passionate about the arts," Blades said.

The last time Blades spoke with Mr. Montgomery, he expressed concern about the need to find the next generation of cultural leaders for the county. He wanted the Cultural Council to play a role in cultivating them, Blades said.

"Once Bob and Mary Montgomery committed themselves to an organization, they donate not only money but their time; that package is not easily found these days," Blades said. "So replacing a person like Bob Montgomery won't happen, but hopefully his legacy will inspire others to take up the mantle to continue to make our cultural institutions strong."

Not all projects succeeded

Not all of the Montgomerys' attempts to enrich the area arts scene achieved long-term success.

The couple purchased a failing contemporary art museum in Lake Worth in 1999. They provided $1.2 million each year for the operating budget of the Palm Beach Institute of Contemporary Art. They invested about $7.5 million in the museum, which included buying the building, renovating it and footing its $100,000-a-month operating budget.

The couple decided to end their affiliation when it became clear others were not stepping up with substantial funds to keep the visual arts showplace afloat. The content of shows at PBICA was hailed by arts critics, but attendance was weak. The museum was shuttered in March 2005.

Began with Jacksonville firm

Mr. Montgomery, a Birmingham, Ala., native, paid his way through the University of Florida Law School. That was in defiance of his father, who wanted him to become a doctor.

Mr. Montgomery began his legal career in 1957 working for Howell & Kirby in Jacksonville. He moved to the Palm Beaches in 1966 to open a branch office for the firm. He later opened his own firm and became widely known as a tenacious, highly successful presence in the courtroom.

Palm Beacher David Roth, a high-profile criminal defense attorney, was a friend of Mr. Montgomery's for 40 years.

"His death is an immense and immeasurable loss to the legal community and society as well. (He was) a great lawyer, a great and unfailing friend and the most charitable man I have ever met," Roth said. "It is still difficult to fathom the loss of someone as influential as Bob."

Originally Mr. Montgomery worked to defend corporations against personal injury and wrongful death lawsuits; he later switched sides. A case he took in the early 1970s was pivotal to that change in course, he told the Palm Beach Daily News in 2002.

He had successfully represented an insurance firm in a personal injury suit. A 4-year-old girl had been left severely brain damaged after her family's car struck a misplaced metal barricade.

Mr. Montgomery's victory left him anything but elated.

"The other lawyer was so inept," Mr. Montgomery recalled. "I couldn't believe I won. I came home and cried, and I said I would never, ever use my talents that way again."

Mr. Montgomery received $210 million in legal fees from the state's 1997 settlement with Big Tobacco. But he readily pointed out to reporters and others that he wasn't exactly poor before he received that payday.

In the same 2002 interview, Mr. Montgomery called himself a "tragedy lawyer," in reference to the Kimberly Bergalis case and others. He won a $1 million settlement for the Fort Pierce woman, who was infected with the HIV virus by her dentist in 1987. She died in 1991.

"Yeah, I make a lot of money from time to time, but I also will take someone who has no insurance," Mr. Montgomery said. "I'm not a crusader, but every once in a while you have to do things like that."

One of his high-profile assignments included representing Theresa LePore, then the embattled county supervisor of elections, following the national headline-making recount of votes in the 2000 presidential race.

He also fought to have gun distributor Valor Corp. of Sunrise found liable for the 2000 death of Lake Worth Middle School teacher Barry Grunow. Nathaniel Brazill, then a 13-year-old student, was convicted in 2001 of shooting the teacher with a semiautomatic "Saturday Night Special" and was sentenced to 28 years in prison.

Mr. Montgomery told the Daily News he incurred more than $300,000 in out-of-pocket expenses to prepare the case for trial.

He brought the lawsuit on behalf of Grunow's widow, Pam, "because I can. I have the wherewithal and I can do anything I want to," he told The Palm Beach Post. "This was something that needed to be done. I did it because I want to get that gun off the market."

In 2003, a jury found the gun distributor partially responsible, but the trial judge threw out the $1.2 million verdict and the 4th District Court of Appeals upheld the judge's decision in 2005.

Civil rights advocate

Mr. Montgomery championed civil rights. In January 2001 he sponsored a speech by Coretta Scott King, widow of assassinated civil-rights pioneer Martin Luther King Jr., as part of the Anne Frank Experience, a monthlong event at the Jewish Community Center of the Palm Beaches designed to educate the public about prejudice.

Mr. Montgomery had been a friend of Southern Poverty Law Center co-founder Morris Dees.

"The message about hate needs to be delivered as strongly as possible," Mr. Montgomery, a supporter of the Anti-Defamation League, said in December 2000. "I can't stand for older people to teach their children biases that they have."

Mr. Montgomery also was a supporter of the Children's Place at Home Safe, the American Cancer Society, the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, American Heart Association, Mounts Botanical Garden, Palm Beach Theater Guild and the Democratic Party.

He is the founder of the Robert M. Montgomery Jr. Cancer Research Fund at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York.

Mary Montgomery and the couple's daughter, Courtnay, have requested donations be sent to the Armory Art Center, 1700 Parker Ave., West Palm Beach, FL 33401. The Montgomerys' son, Scott, died in 1992.

Funeral arrangements had not been announced at press time.

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HIGHLIGHTS

* Trial lawyer, Robert M. Montgomery Jr. & Associates, P.I.

* Principal supporter, Armory Art Center.

* Chairman emeritus, Palm Beach Opera; chairman of its board for 22 years.

* Founding board member, Kravis Center for the Performing Arts.

* Founder, Robert M. Montgomery Jr. Cancer Research Fund at Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

* Honors: Victim Advocate of the Year; Child Advocate of the Year; the Humanitarian Award from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine; The Anti-Defamation League?s Haym Salomon Award; the Heartland Award for Service to the Children of Florida; the NAACP?s Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Award; the Excellence in Philanthropy Award from the Florida Association of Non-Profit Organizations; and the Urban League?s 2005 Lifetime Achievement Award.

* 2002: Won a $1.2 million jury verdict against the distributor of a ?Saturday night special? handgun that Lake Worth Middle School student Nathaniel Brazill used to shoot and kill teacher Barry Grunow. However, the trial judge threw out the verdict.

* 2000: Represented Theresa LePore in the headline-making recount of Palm Beach County votes.

* 1999: Bob and Mary Montgomery bought the Museum of Contemporary Art in Lake Worth for $500,000 from the Palm Beach Community College Foundation when it seemed the area?s only contemporary art museum would go under.

* 1997: In the State of Florida vs. American Tobacco, Montgomery was lead counsel in orchestrating a landmark $11.3 billion settlement for the state. He told the Palm Beach County Bar Association in 2000 that the case was considered unwinnable until they produced documents indicating the tobacco industry was targeting children.

* 1991: Won a $1 million settlement for Kimberly Bergalis of Fort Pierce who contracted AIDS as a teenager through a tooth extraction by her HIV-positive dentist.

* 1990: Represented an expectant mother and her young child, whose car was struck by a truck that had run a red light. The woman lost her unborn child and suffered a severe brain injury. The case was settled for $10 million.

* 1987: Helped transform a former National Guard Armory into a nonprofit art school.

* 1975: Started own law firm specializing in personal injury cases.

* 1973: Won verdict in excess of $700,000 representing a plaintiff in a medical malpractice case in St. Petersburg, launching his career as a personal injury lawyer.

* 1966: Opened Palm Beach branch office of Howell & Kirby law firm.

* 1957: Worked for Howell & Kirby in Jacksonville.

* 1957: Graduated University of Florida Law School.

* Graduated the University of Alabama, where he met his future wife, Mary McKenzie, who was also a student.

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Staff writers Margie Kacoha and Betty Nelander contributed to this report.