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John F. Leitzel, a retired insurance broker and agency owner, died of heart failure Dec. 21 at the Joseph Richey Hospice in downtown Baltimore. The Dundalk resident was 95.
Born in Coatesville, Pa., he was the son of Alvin Leitzel Sr., a Bethlehem Steel employee, and the former Esther Anna Keefer, a homemaker. The family moved to Dundalk in 1931 and later lived in Sparrows Point. Mr. Leitzel was a 1935 graduate of Sparrows Point High School and attended Strayer, Bryant and Stratton Business College at Charles and Fayette streets.
After working in Bethlehem Steel's purchasing department, he enlisted in the Army Air Forces in 1944. A secretary to a colonel, he was assigned to Bury St. Edmunds in England and Wiesbaden, Germany.
He then earned a business administration degree at the University of Maryland, College Park.
He began as a claims adjuster for Farm Bureau Insurance and later was a Nationwide agent and owner who worked from an office at Old North Point Boulevard and Wise Avenue. He later sold the business and worked for Kroh, Miller and Knight. He retired in 1980.
Services will be held at 10 a.m. Saturday at the Patapsco United Methodist Church, 7800 Wise Ave., where he was a member.
Survivors include two sons, John Spencer Leitzel of Dundalk and James Allen Leitzel of Chicago; two daughters, Janet Lee Leitzel of Reisterstown and Susan L. Kelly of Bel Air; a sister, Velma E. Bessent of Towson; and three grandchildren. His wife of 61 years, the former Virginia Doris Mae Hines, a United Methodist minister and teacher, died in 2010.