Major General George Hamden Olmsted (March 18, 1901 – October 8, 1998) was an American military officer and insurance executive. Throughout Olmsted's career, he was a champion of the concepts of better education, jobs, and opportunities for all people. In the fields of banking and insurance, he brought availability and affordability of products and services to a market that was battered by the Great Depression. He carried on the dream of Arthur J. Morris, the founder of Financial General Corporation, that "anyone who has a steady job can qualify for installment credit from a bank".
Early life
George H. Olmsted was born in Des Moines, Iowa, the second of four children of Ernest and Alice Lockwood Olmsted. He graduated from West High School in Des Moines and attended Iowa State University briefly during the fall of 1918, before receiving his appointment to the United States Military Academy at West Point on November 4, 1918.
During his four-year attendance at West Point, he was President of his class for three years. He graduated on June 22, 1922, holding the position of First Captain of the Corps of Cadets, ranking second in his class academically. He also served as Chairman of the Student Honor Committee and Assistant Business Manager of the Howitzer, the annual yearbook. In athletics, General Olmsted was the featherweight boxing champion of the academy and won his varsity "A" as manager and second-string quarterback of the 1922 Army football team.
Civilian interlude
After graduation, Olmsted served in the active army until October 1923 when he returned to civilian life in Des Moines to enter business with his father who was running a small insurance agency.
By the beginning of 1924, they had expanded the agency into a general line fire and casualty agency named Olmsted & Olmsted. In September 1924, he married Virginia Camp, his high school sweetheart and left his father to start his own firm, Olmsted Inc. Agency. By 1928, his business had grown sufficiently to enable him to make his first purchase of another company, Travelers Mutual Casualty Company of Des Moines.
Attracting a great following among the younger businessmen of Des Moines, George Olmsted was elected President of the Junior Chamber of Commerce of Des Moines in 1927 and in 1929 was elected President of the National Junior Chamber of Commerce. A notable accomplishment during his tenure was the establishment of the "Outstanding Young Man of the Year" award. He attracted the attention of prominent persons at the national level of the Republican Party and was invited to meet with President Herbert Hoover at the White House. The President asked him to direct the activities of the Young Republican Division of the party in the upcoming general election of 1932 which he did. After the election, he continued to direct the Division until it evolved into the Young Republican National Committee which elected him its first President. He later served as the head of the Young Republican National Federation.
Travelers Mutual struggled through the depression years becoming one of the first companies to offer insurance and premium financing to the fledgling long haul trucking industry. Operations were expanded into Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, and Illinois. In 1938, George Olmsted purchased the United Automobile Insurance Company of Grand Rapids, Michigan, and the Hawkeye Casualty Company of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. This was followed in 1940 by the purchase of the Illinois Casualty Company of Springfield, Illinois. Operating headquarters for all of the companies were consolidated in Des Moines and a management team was established that would carry the companies through the hard years to come.
World War II
Recalled to active service in the Army in January 1942, then Major Olmsted led the Requirements and Assignments Branch, International Division, Army Service Forces which handled Lend Lease requests from allied governments for Army material and equipment. In this position he had to balance the complex, simultaneous equations of American industrial production schedules and capacity, American military requirements, urgent requests for help from allied governments and the demands of the current strategic situation. Frantic appeals were coming to the United States from Great Britain, the Soviet Union, China, and Free French Forces in North Africa. All of these appeals had to be dealt with as rapidly or as diplomatically as possible. In addition, Olmsted established programs to ensure delivery of assistance to the correct place at the promised time as well as programs to train the recipients in the use and maintenance of the equipment.