John Doyle DeWitt (June 25, 1902 – December 27, 1972) was an American businessman and a noted authority on American political numismatics.
Life and Career
DeWitt was born in Sully, Iowa. He served in the United States Navy during World War I and attended Drake University from 1921 to 1924. He married Marjorie Aileen Everett on October 3, 1927, with whom he had a son and a daughter.
DeWitt spent his entire working career with the Travelers Insurance Company. He joined the company in 1925 as a claims investigator and rose through the ranks to become president (1952–1965), director, and ultimately chairman of the board. During his presidency, he created the Travelers Weather Research Center, the world's first privately owned research institute for the scientific study of weather. He also served as a director of the Chase Manhattan Bank, the Hartford National Bank and Trust Company, Hartford Hospital, the Southern New England Telephone Company, and United Aircraft Corporation. He received an honorary LL.D. from Drake University in 1955.
Collecting and Scholarship
DeWitt is best remembered for his monographs on American political history and for his extraordinary collection of American presidential campaign memorabilia, which contained more than 25,000 individual pieces. He donated the collection to the University of Hartford. In 1959, he wrote A Century of Campaign Buttons, the first definitive reference source on political campaign medals and buttons.
Selected Monographs
- Election Medals of the Campaign of 1844 (1943)
- Medalets of the Presidential Campaign of 1848 (1948)
- A Century of Campaign Buttons 1789–1889 (1959)
- America Goes To The Polls: Highlights of the Presidential Campaigns 1789–1960 (1960)
- Lincoln in Hartford (1960)
- Alfred S. Robinson, Hartford Numismatist (1968)
