In Remembrance: Leigh Stephenson-Kuhn ’58 Died on January 4 2017

View full image

Leigh DeCamp Stephenson-Kuhn, 79, a retired corporate lawyer widely known for his dedicated service to his city and his passionate support of the arts, died unexpectedly on January 4, 2017, at Oregon Health & Science University, following a stroke.

During a legal career of more than 50 years, he was deeply engaged in Portland civic life, leading projects that ranged from a study on the role of Portland State University in its community to a major assessment by the City Club of Portland on the region’s future transportation needs and challenges. He served as board president of the Portland Opera, the Oregon Episcopal School, and Portland State University Foundation; he served on the boards of the Oregon College of Arts and Crafts Foundation and Business for Culture and the Arts. He was a past president of the Yale Alumni Association of Oregon.

He was admitted to the Oregon Bar in 1962 and joined the law firm now called Lane Powell PC; he became partner in 1967 and remained at that firm until he retired in 2012.  He was recognized as a leading expert in pension and profit-sharing law, as well as health, compensation plans, and employee benefits. He was recognized as one of the “Best Lawyers in America” by Employee Benefits (ERISA) from 1998 to 2014, and was named an “Oregon Super Lawyer.” He was also noted in Portland Monthly as one of Portland’s best lawyers.

In an entry in 2012 for his Yale Class of ’58 Reunion Book, he noted the events and accomplishments that were especially important in his life: “Finding a lifetime soul mate after losing my first wife to cancer. Leading [as board president] Oregon Episcopal School through the devastating loss of eight students and two adults on Mount Hood in May 1986. Building my employee benefit pension plan legal practice to the point where I can hand it off to a very able team of successors, knowing that the clients will be better served. Having great kids and grandkids who are healthy, vibrant, and well adjusted to life. Having the time, energy, and means to enjoy life to the fullest.”

Living life to the fullest meant always looking forward, greeting each day with determination, and assuming the challenge of every experience, such as climbing Machu Picchu after an earlier stroke and snorkeling after almost drowning. It included extensive world travel, developing a collection of fine Oregon pinot noirs, and immersing himself in art. He was an avid season subscriber to many cultural arts programs, ranging from the traditional to the contemporary and experimental. He was a sustaining patron of the Portland Institute of Contemporary Art and Profile Theater. He loved to dance.

He was born Leigh DeCamp Stephenson on February 15, 1937, in Great Falls, Montana, the son of John DeCamp Stephenson BR ’30 and Rhoda Deuel Stephenson. Growing up near the Missouri River and learning at age five to fly-fish at the family’s cabin in the Highwood Mountains, he developed a lifelong love of the great outdoors and an abiding commitment to ecology and conservation. There too, his interest in art was kindled by an exposure to scenes of the West by the painter Charles Russell. It would later manifest in his dedication to photography, as he was seldom seen outside of work without a camera in hand during much of his adult life.

After graduating from Phillips Exeter Academy, in Exeter, New Hampshire, in 1954, he entered Yale University, where he rowed crew and spent his junior year at the Sorbonne in Paris, nurturing a love of French art and culture. He returned to New Haven with a print by Matisse that he had purchased, and began developing his senior thesis on French colonialism in Madagascar.

When he completed his studies at Yale in 1958, he married Mary Hall Gurney, of Milton, Massachusetts, whom he had met on a blind date during his freshman year.  The couple moved to New York where he entered Columbia Law School that fall.  After law school, the promise of a clerkship with Judge Gus Solomon brought him to Portland, where he built a career and raised his family.

After the death of his first wife in 1995, he was remarried in 1998 to Kathleen Johnson Kuhn. In addition to his widow, he is survived by his daughter, Sarah D. Stephenson Keyes BR ’85 (Norman), Devon, Pennsylvania; son, Leigh B. Stephenson (Russel Garrison), Houston, Texas; Jennifer Johnson-Hanks (William Hanks), Berkeley, California; Elizabeth Kuhn-Wilken (Oliver), Gig Harbor, Washington; and eight grandchildren. He was the brother of John Deuel Stephenson-Love BR ’56 (Sue-Ann) of Great Falls, Montana, and Anne Stephenson Glickman (Franklin), of Boston, Massachusetts.

Donations in his memory may be made to Planned Parenthood or the Union of Concerned Scientists. 

—Submitted by the family.