L. Brooks Leavitt(1878–1941) was an investment banker andantiquarianbook collector who served as anoverseerofBowdoin College,to whose library he donated part of his collection of rare books and manuscripts. Born inWilton, Maine,to a father who was a stagecoach driver who died when Leavitt was young, Brooks Leavitt was an aesthete turned banker whom Maine's poet laureate later eulogized at his funeral.
Biography
editLeon Brooks Leavitt was born to William Newcomb Leavitt and Ada Idela (Russell) Leavitt[1]in Wilton, Maine, on April 3, 1878.[2]Leavitt's father dropped dead of a heart attack when Brooks Leavitt was attending Wilton Academy. Leavitt subsequently attendedBowdoin CollegeinBrunswick, Maine,where he became a voracious reader, and to which he later helped send his younger brother Russell by paying his tuition.
On graduating, Leavitt worked briefly as the principal of aFarmington, Mainehigh school, and then went to work for theUnited States Census Bureau.Leavitt subsequently attendedGeorge Washington University Law SchoolinWashington, D.C.,and practiced law briefly inNew York City,before joining theWall Streetinvestment bankingfirm of Bertram, Griscom & Company.[3]
Within a few years, Leavitt joined the investment banking firm ofPaine, Webber & Co.,where he worked at the firm's headquarters onWall StreetinManhattan.Leavitt became a bond specialist, and was later one of the partners in charge of the company. While working at Paine Webber, Leavitt indulged his true loves – literature, oriental carpets and the companionship of artists and writers of the day. Having eventually made a fortune on Wall Street, Leavitt retired back to his belovedMaine.
One of Leavitt's lifelong friends wasRobert P. T. Coffin,a fellowMainer,Bowdoin graduate and Bowdoin professor. Coffin dedicated his novelCaptain Abbey and Captain Johnto his friend Leavitt, "a fellow son of Maine." Following Leavitt's death from heart disease, Coffin eulogized him in his poem "Brooks Leavitt", read at Leavitt's 1941 funeral in Wilton. A longtime patron of the arts, Brooks Leavitt was close to many New York artists and actors, includingFrancis Wilson,the foremostBroadwaystage actor of his day.[4]Among other of Leavitt's lifelong friends was the American explorerDonald Baxter MacMillan,with whom Leavitt regularly corresponded.[5]
Among the manuscripts owned and collected by Leavitt, who turned tobook collectingafter theWall Street Crash of 1929,was an originalShakespeareFirst Folio,as well as the original manuscript ofD. H. Lawrence'sSons and Lovers,written in Lawrence's own hand.
Leavitt was married to the former Elizabeth Burns Purman, who was born inWashington, D.C.,the daughter of Dr. James Jackson Purman and Mary Witherow Purman of Washington, D.C. Dr Purman was the recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor for gallantry in the battle of Gettysburg. Brooks Leavitt and his wife lived inManhattanand at their second home in Leavitt's birthplace ofWilton, Maine,where the couple's home was designed by the Maine architectJohn Calvin Stevens.[6]The couple had no children. Brooks Leavitt served as an overseer of Bowdoin College, and subsequently donated manuscripts to the Bowdoin Library by alumniNathaniel Hawthorne,Franklin Pierce,andHenry Wadsworth Longfellow.[7][8]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^Ada Idela Russell's ancestor was the ScotsmanRobert RussellofAndover, Massachusetts,the first person to be buried in Andover's recently-designated 'South Parish Burying-Yard' in 1710. Her father, Brooks Dascomb Russell, enlisted in the13th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regimentat the outbreak of theAmerican Civil Warat age 15. He was subsequently wounded at theBattle of Pleasant Hill.A longtime resident ofWeld, Maine[1],where he was afarrierand blacksmith, he died inSan Jose, Californiain 1895, just as the papers for his military pension were finally being processed.[2]
- ^Leavitt's younger brother V. Russell Leavitt, who also attended Bowdoin College, became an early partner of Paine, Webber & Co. as well.[3]A third brother, Dana Milton Leavitt, died during childhood when his high-chair fell over and killed him at age two.
- ^General Catalogue of Bowdoin College and the Medical School of Maine, 1794–1912, Published by the College, Brunswick, Maine, 1912
- ^Correspondence between Francis Wilson and L. Brooks Leavitt, Francis Wilson papers, The New York Public Library, Billy Rose Theater Division, npl.org
- ^Matthew A. Henson's Historic Arctic Journey: The Classic Account of One of the World's Greatest Black Explorers, Vol. 5, The Explorers Club Classics, Lyons Press Series, Reprinted by the Globe Pequot, 2009ISBN1-59921-308-7ISBN978-1-59921-308-8
- ^Drawing of Leavitt Residence, Wilton, ca. 1925, Maine Memory Network mainememory.net
- ^Nathaniel Hawthorne documents, Gift of L. Brooks Leavitt, Hawthorneinsalem.org
- ^Nathaniel Hawthorne documents, Gift of L. Brooks Leavitt, Hawthorneinsalem.org