[1] Leavitt ran the family-owned trading partnership, and was one of the most prominent businessmen of his age until financial reverses caused the bankruptcy of the firm.

In spite of the financial reverses, Leavitt and his wife went on to help raise their granddaughter painter Beaux after her mother died shortly after she was born and her French father fled back to France.

Operating primarily as traders, sometimes with first cousin David Leavitt, the pair bought and sold nearly everything, including real estate in Illinois and Georgia.

[11] Heavily involved in charitable work, Leavitt also served as a director of the New York Institution for the Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb.

[21][22] By 1850 New York newspapers were heralding the upcoming marriage of the daughter of the prosperous Connecticut-born merchant to the scion of a French-family-owned silk-manufacturing firm.

By the time of Cecilia Beaux's mother's death, Leavitt and his wife were living in austere circumstances, following the collapse of his once-thriving business.

Countless suits were filed against John Wheeler Leavitt and his brother Rufus by creditors anxious to reclaim what was left of their funds.

But in spite of the collapse of the family firm, grandparents John Wheeler and Cecilia Kent Leavitt took in the two children,[26] and proved instrumental in raising them through the years.

The unsettled years during the American Civil War were particularly difficult, as Beaux's absent father provided little emotional or financial support, and her Leavitt grandparents had lost much of their wealth and prominence.

[30] John Wheeler Leavitt is buried within Vault 39 of New York Marble Cemetery, a resting place he purchased in 1830, when times were good.

[31] The cemetery, built on the northern edge of Manhattan's development, was a favored resting place for New York's leading professional and merchant families.