Remembering a life of passion

If there is one word to describe Donald Robert Pitti, the financial planning pioneer who died Dec. 18 at the age of 80, it would be “enthusiasm.”

At InvestmentNews, that enthusiasm was especially appreciated, since he helped launch the paper in 1997 and remained a consultant and a member of its advisory board up until his death.

“All of us at InvestmentNews mourn the unexpected loss of our dear friend and a true pioneer in the financial planning industry,” publisher Suzanne Siracuse said. “Don’s tremendous knowledge of the financial industry provided us with many story ideas and identified key trends within the adviser marketplace. He will be deeply missed by our staff and the industry as a whole.”

Mr. Pitti’s colleagues and friends — not to mention his wife of 55 years, Grace — all spoke of the passion he brought to everything he did, from his work, to volunteering with children in his hometown of Manhasset, N.Y., to playing beach volleyball on the Long Island shore.

Mr. Pitti was born Sept. 15, 1929, in New York. As a youth, he spent his summers in Rocky Point, N.Y., on the North Shore of Long Island. It was there that he met Grace Curtis, his future wife, when he was 17 and she was 14. “He just always stood out above the crowd, and I had good taste,” Mrs. Pitti remembered with a chuckle.

The 6-foot-2-inch Mr. Pitti joined the Navy when he was 18, served for a year and then enrolled in New York University. Called back to serve in the Korean War, he spent his tour of duty on the USS Midway in the Mediterranean. “That experience really opened up a whole world to him,” said Mrs. Pitti, who married her husband in 1954.

OPERA LOVER

Mr. Pitti loved opera, especially the works of Puccini and Verdi, but his taste wasn’t just highbrow — he had a special fondness for Willie Nelson songs, too, his wife said.

When Mr. Pitti returned to NYU to study journalism, he became editor of the college newspaper and worked two jobs at night, one as an usher at Radio City Music Hall, and the other as a “soda jerk” at Schrafft’s, a popular restaurant chain at the time. On weekends, he worked in the men’s department at Lord & Taylor.

“He always had that drive to get ahead, to be better,” Mrs. Pitti remembered. “Whatever he did, he did with such enthusiasm.”

One of Mr. Pitti’s first jobs in the financial services industry was with Arthur Wiesenberger & Co., a member broker-dealer of the New York Stock Exchange that published mutual fund research. He served as president of the firm from 1967 to 1976. When Arthur Wiesenberger was acquired by John Nuveen & Co., Mr. Pitti joined the latter firm as a partner and chief marketing officer, remaining there until 1987.

He went on to serve as chairman and chief executive of Monarch Financial Services Inc., eventually retiring in December 1994 as a managing director of J. & W. Seligman & Co., an investment manager.

After he retired, Mr. Pitti became the founding director of the Financial Services Institute at the Tobin College of Business at St. John’s University in New York, and served as an adjunct professor of finance.

Throughout his career, Mr. Pitti was admired and respected for his service to the financial planning profession. He was a member of the Financial Planning Association and its predecessor organizations since 1969, the same year he helped start the College for Financial Planning. He was chairman of the Foundation for Financial Planning from 1994 to 2000. The FPA presented him with the P. Kemp Fain Jr. Award for outstanding contributions to the profession in 2008.

Many of his colleagues remember him especially for spearheading a volunteer effort after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. He helped raise about $12 million to allow financial planners to provide free advice for the families of victims.

REPUTATION A KEY

Alexandra Armstrong, chairman of Armstrong Fleming & Moore Inc., recalled that Mr. Pitti’s reputation meant a lot during the fundraising stage.

“That we were able to raise money in that environment was a good example of his credibility,” she said. “Don had this uncanny way of anticipating situations and thinking about how things could be done better, and moving to do things better.”

Marvin W. Tuttle Jr., executive director and CEO of the FPA, said that Mr. Pitti always had a passion for spreading the word about financial planning. “He saw that this could be a profession that would be very useful to the average American,” Mr. Tuttle said. “That was something that just possessed him.”

A longtime acquaintance, Tim Kochis, former chief executive and future chairman of the wealth management firm Aspiriant, said: “He was, up to the very end, an enormously energetic and insightful person, with almost a childlike enthusiasm about the future of the financial planning and wealth management business. Our industry has lost a true giant.”

Mr. Pitti is survived by his wife, his children, Robert Pitti and Gail Cerick; his son-in-law, Richard Cerick; his daughter-in-law, Anne Pitti; and his grandchildren, Matthew, Julie, Mark and Scott Cerick, and Samantha and Joseph Pitti.