An Indiana attorney, representing the third generation of his family to serve as lawyers in Indiana County, has eclipsed half a century of service in the local, state and federal courts.
Myron Hay Tomb Jr. said he made his mark on the lives of county residents in a career of helping local community organizations to navigate the increasingly complicated landscape of assuring their compliance with state and federal laws.
Tomb is the fifth attorney of his clan to practice in Indiana County courts; he has shepherded the investments of more than $20 million for the formation of municipal water systems and redevelopment projects, and logged nearly a century as the legal adviser for governing board of eight local, school and county boards.
Never enamored by the allure of being a criminal defense attorney and the drama of arguing defendants’ fates before juries of their peers, Tomb chose early in his career to dedicate his efforts to the protection and betterment of entire communities.
“They would be the hallmarks of my early career,” Tomb said. He counseled Indiana Area School District and its joint school authority (for building projects) for 22 years; represented the Redevelopment Authority of Indiana County for 16 years; and advised Indiana County board of commissioners, Indiana County Development Authority and Clymer Borough Council for eight years each in the 1980s and 1990s.
His most rewarding years as a public sector solicitor, Tomb said, were his tenures with community water authorities including the Wheatfield Water Authority and Highridge Water Authority boards in their formative years.
“I look back at the water projects as some of the fun stuff,” Tomb said. “My best friend, Tom Trimm, asked me to meet with his parents who lived near Clyde because they were losing their water to the mining. I met with his father and some of the neighbors, literally at the kitchen table at Bill Trimm’s house. Tom and I got together, decided that we have some time and energy, we had some contacts in Harrisburg, let’s try to get some funding and make this happen.
“We set out to buy the Robinson part of the Highridge water system so we could reduce the average income level and get funding, and it worked. We funded Wheatfield Water Authority and they built that system for nothing, then Highridge came to me… to see if I could find a way to buy their company.”
Highridge, then a private system, was unable to pay the cost of a newly mandated system improvement.
“With a lot of tax help from Tom Trimm’s firm in Pittsburgh, we managed to do that because they wanted us to buy stock and not assets. Getting the IRS to approve that transaction was really a hurdle. But we got that done and we merged Highridge with Wheatfield. That’s how the system came together.”
The projects hinged on leverage of $10.1 million of financing; today the systems operate under the Highridge name.
“We were so exhausted when we closed Highridge. We had to celebrate another day,” he said. “You work for years on projects like this, never knowing if it will work.”
Taking litigation before a jury, Tomb said, “was the most focused experience I ever had. You have to listen to every word, and you have to decide whether to react and how you will do it.
“From the moment you walk in until you leave at the end of the day, you’re in the zone and its quite an experience,” Tomb said.
Once he found himself so far into the zone that he didn’t realize the intensity of a back ache that came upon him in the courtroom until he left the building and first felt the pain.
“I had been concentrating on every minute detail of testimony … that nothing else had enough importance to gain any attention – not even pain,” Tomb explained in a 1993 memo to a colleague. “I don’t know why this happens but I have grown to love the experience.”
Tomb called the courtroom “a great battlefield” in that memo.
“Getting dressed he morning of a trial, I feel like a boxer putting on the gloves in the basement of a seedy old gym. There doesn’t have to be anything pretty about it, but I want to take control of the duel and successfully argue my case more than anything else in the world,” he wrote.
The intensity of arguing a case in the courtroom has been the exception for Tomb. More often, he said, his success and satisfaction has been in the comprehensive preparation that resulted in early out-of-court settlements for his clients.
For the past decade following heart surgery, Tomb has dialed back the intensity of his work and focused on estates and planning. He joined the North Sixth Street law office of Aaron Ludwig and John Cawley in 2020.
Tomb’s grandfather, D.H. Tomb, led the family into law and had a practice from 1887 until his death in 1912.
Two of Myron Tomb’s uncles, D.R. Tomb and J. Wayne “Nink” Tomb, started the Tomb & Tomb law firm in 1913, and D.R. Tomb’s son, Dave, later joined the firm.
Myron Tomb earned his law degree in 1972 from the University of Pittsburgh, attended U.S. Army officer training at Fort Benning, Ga., later that year, then was admitted to practice before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Jan. 8, 1973. That’s when he joined the family partnership.
Tomb and his cousin practiced from the same office until 1983; Myron Tomb then ran a solo practice from 1983 to 1992, and operated a partnership with Joseph Mack and Thomas Kauffman until 2011. In tandem with his law practice, Tomb has devoted his efforts to the support and advancement of the arts in Indiana County and across the state.
“One of the things I look back on with a lot of pride is serving 19 years on the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts,” he said. “It’s been a big part of my life. We formed a statewide partnership at IUP to develop arts in education statewide.” Tomb was nominated to the council by Democratic Gov. Robert Casey and served under four subsequent governors of both parties until 2011.
“That was a privilege, to serve through democratic and republican administrations, and start arts in education partnerships.”
Republican Gov. Tom Corbett honored Tomb in 2014 with the Governor’s Award for leadership and service.
“We helped to raise millions of dollars in private and government funding. It was a great honor. I met wonderful people who are dear friends to this day.”
Tomb, 75, said he remains as dedicated to promotion of the arts as he is diligent to his practice of law.
“I’m a firm believer that arts develop creative thought and they also help people relate to their world — for example, I am dyslexic, so it was always very difficult for me to learn to read. But I think a lot of dyslexic people relate strongly to the arts. So, if you have an art project to make math or other areas seem more real to them … then you’re engaging their interest in things instead of making them feel like they’re less than productive.”
Tomb earned a degree in economics at Indiana University of Pennsylvania before he went for his law degree at Pitt.
He has been a member of Indiana County Bar Association, the Pennsylvania Bar association, the American Association of Trial Lawyers and the NSBA Council of School Attorneys.
He was admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court in June 1980.
After 50 years in the profession, he still considers his uncle and cousin his greatest advisers.
“D.R. and Dave were excellent mentors, teaching me to always think things through and to understand the importance of communicating effectively,” Tomb said.