Edward I. Devitt was born in St. John, New Brunswick, Canada, in November 1840. When he was a child, his family moved to Boston, where he attended public schools and graduated from Boston English High School in 1857. He attended Holy Cross College for two years and then applied for admission to the Society of Jesus. He entered the Jesuit novitiate at Frederick, Maryland, in 1859. Having studied at Frederick for four years, Father Devitt was sent to Washington to teach at Gonzaga College preparatory school. While at Gonzaga, he was selected to march in President Lincoln’s funeral procession with a group of students. After leaving Gonzaga, he studied at the Jesuit seminary at Woodstock, Maryland, and, after his ordination, taught philosophy at Woodstock College and at Holy Cross College.

Father Devitt came to Boston College as rector and ninth president in 1891. During his tenure, he paid particular attention to the development of the college’s library, increasing the size of the collection to over 23,000 volumes and helping to reorganize storage across three accessible rooms. He also oversaw significant expansion of the science departments.

After leaving Boston College in 1894, Devitt served as Curator of Historical Archives at Georgetown University. He died at Georgetown University, at the age of eighty, in 1920.

Sources

Donovan, Charles F., David R. Dunigan, and Paul A. FitzGerald. History of Boston College: From the Beginnings to 1990. Chestnut Hill, MA: The University Press of Boston College, 1990.

"Reverend E.I. McDevitt [sic] Dies at Georgetown, President of Boston College 1890-1894," The Heights, vol.1, no. 9, January 30, 1920. Accessed June 26 2013, http://newspapers.bc.edu/cgi-bin/bostonsh?a=d&d=bcheights19200130.1.1