James L. Lovett (c. 1840-1922) was born in Colerain, Ohio, and died in New York, New York. He worked as a farmhand in Springfield, Indiana, in the early 1860s before enlisting in the Union Army where he served in Company E of the 21st Pennsylvania Cavalry until 1864. He subsequently moved to Omaha, Nebraska, where he married Rebecca J. Murphy in 1871. Lovett was involved in oilfield investment and development before becoming the Director of the Home Fire Insurance Company of Omaha in 1884, a position he held until the early 1890s when he moved to Portland, Maine. He subsequently became the President and Manager of the Portland branch of the Keeley Institute, an unconventional alcoholic treatment center based on the popular yet controversial "gold cure" theories of Dr. Leslie Keeley. The Portland branch was one of over a hundred Keeley Institutes throughout the United States and Europe at that time, and Lovett managed it until his retirement in 1911. While living in Omaha, Lovett was acquainted with Kate L. Morse, also of Omaha, who had received Christian Science treatment from Jennie B. Fenn, a student of Mary Baker Eddy's. Lovett wrote to Eddy in 1886 for a copy of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures. Based on the records available, we have found no further information concerning his involvement with Christian Science.

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