Terrance Keenan, 85, health care foundation executive

Terrance Keenan, 85, of Newtown, Bucks County, who as an executive and consultant with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in Princeton distributed more than 900 grants to health-care institutions and providers, died of heart failure Feb. 25 at Manor Care in Yardley.

"Terry Keenan set the standard for creativity, caring, and vision in philanthropy. He never lost sight of the people he was trying to help," foundation president Risa Lavizzo-Mourey said.

In 1972, Mr. Keenan became vice president of the foundation, which had recently received a $1 billion bequest from Robert Wood Johnson, then chief executive officer of Johnson & Johnson. The gift made the foundation the second-largest philanthropy in the nation, behind the Ford Foundation. It is now third, behind the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Ford. From the beginning, the Johnson organization focused on a single area: health care.

Under Mr. Keenan's direction, the foundation brought health care to rural areas and blighted urban neighborhoods, established programs to prepare minority students to enter the health professions, and provided funding to educate more general practitioners.

He was a champion of nurses, said his wife, Joette Lehan Keenan. Mr. Keenan initiated programs to create specialized clinical training for nurses, restructure nursing care at hospitals, create clinics led by nurse practitioners, expand the role of nurses in emergency care in rural areas, promote nurse-staffed school clinics, and train and promote nurses to executive leadership in health organizations.

Mr. Keenan was a pioneer in partnerships between health and faith-based organizations to improve and expand care for the chronically ill.

In his 1992 monograph on philanthropy, "The Promise at Hand: Prospects for Foundation Leadership in the 1990s," Mr. Keenan wrote: "A great foundation is informed and animated by moral purpose, walks humbly, is deliberate, accountable, and self-renewing." In 1993, Grantmakers in Health established the annual Terrance Keenan Leadership Award.

After retiring as vice president for special projects, Mr. Keenan consulted for the foundation and was in his office as recently as six weeks ago, his wife said.

Mr. Keenan grew up in Bucks County and graduated from New Hope Solebury High School. During World War II, he was a Navy flight navigator in the Pacific.

After his discharge, he earned a bachelor's degree from Yale University and then taught at Jefferson Preparatory School in St. Louis.

In 1955, he moved to New York and worked for Merrill Lynch, where he helped write a biography of the firm's founder, Charles Merrill. He began his career in philanthropy in 1956 when he joined the Ford Foundation. From 1965 until 1972, he was secretary to the board of the Commonwealth Fund in New York.

Mr. Keenan, whose father, Peter J., was a well-known modernist painter, was a wonderful watercolorist, his wife said. He enjoyed the company of his cats and dachshunds, drives through the Bucks County countryside, and long weekends in Cape May.

In addition to his wife of 30 years, Mr. Keenan is survived by a sister, Sheila Keeler, and nieces and nephews.

A graveside service will be held at 2 p.m. tomorrow at St. Martin of Tours Cemetery, 1 Riverstone Circle, New Hope.

Memorial donations may be made to the Make-a-Wish Foundation, One Valley Square, 512 Township Line Rd., Blue Bell, Pa. 19422.