Daniel Collier, who died March 22 at 70, was a former Army colonel, West Point instructor, and a securities expert at the Wall Street firm of Carl Marks & Co.

At Carl Marks, Collier was a vice president charged with following up on international government bonds that had been repudiated — including those of the imperial Russian government.

The Marks firm specialized in bringing suits against successor governments to demand payment. Even after winning a judgment, collecting on the debt could be difficult.

“Daniel Collier … is not holding his breath,” Time magazine reported in 1983. “In his firm’s offices, one of the Russian bonds is mounted, with a small hammer beside it, along with the words: IN CASE OF SETTLEMENT, BREAK GLASS.”

Still, there was an aftermarket for collectors in colorful old bonds from exotic locales. A Hukuang Railroad bond issued by the imperial Chinese government in 1911 could go for $50 or more, in good condition.

Collier liked to make collages from old bonds, which he gave to friends. After retiring from Carl Marks in the mid-1980s, he pursued an interest in ephemera, buying and selling collections of old movie posters, 1950s paperbacks, and numerous other items.

He was raised in Cincinnati, where his father owned a shoe factory. Collier went to Harvard, where he studied literature and joined the ROTC. After the war, he served as an Army officer, eventually reaching the rank of full colonel.

Among his assignments was serving in Vietnam as a staff historian to General William Westmoreland. He took classes at the University of Dakar in Senegal and became an area specialist on Africa. After earning a master’s degree at American University, he taught international relations at West Point.

After Westmoreland died, one friend remembered Collier regaling a few friends at the Harvard Club bar. When the topic came to the 17-gun salute that Westmoreland was given at West Point, Collier proceeded to offer a detailed history of the gun salutes, noting that the number 17 was chosen because in 1810, when the War Department established what was called the national salute, there were 17 states in the union.

Collier was a collector and sometimes vendor of rare documents. Upon learning of the interest of a new acquaintance in Jewish matters, he promptly invited him to his apartment, where he produced an original, carefully preserved edition of the Gazette of the United States that included, on its front page, one of George Washington’s letters to the Jewish community.

In the early 1970s, Collier joined Carl Marks, where he helped oversee Russian bonds. The firm made a market in the bonds, which thrived during détente, reaching a high of about 10% of face value during the early 1970s. By 1982, When Carl Marks & Co. sued the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the bonds were down to 2% of face. The government of Russia continues not to redeem them.

But Collier, who served on his Park Avenue co-op board, did not lose hope entirely. Confronted with some old bonds that had been turned into a lampshade, he admitted to Forbes in 1992, “The lamination can make them a little hard to work with.”

Collier was cheerful and loquacious fixture at the Harvard Club of New York, where he played squash and, almost daily for years, greeted a wide circle of friends. They packed a large room at the club last week for a memorial service, where he was remembered not only for his modesty but for the astonishing breadth of his knowledge.

Born March 4, 1937, in Cincinnati; died March 22 at Lenox Hill Hospital after suffering an aneurism; survived by his wife, Elizabeth White, and children, Alexandra and Robert.