Charles Gates Dawes

Charles Gates Dawes was born in Marietta, Ohio, a direct descendant of American Revolutionary patriot William Dawes. Educated in law at the Cincinnati Law School, Dawes practiced in Lincoln, Nebraska, before building a financial career in Chicago as president of the Central Trust Company of Illinois. Serving as Comptroller of the Currency under President William McKinley, Dawes was also a gifted self-taught pianist and composer whose 1911 instrumental melody 'Melody in A Major' was later adapted into the worldwide pop standard 'It's All in the Game'.

During World War I, Dawes served as a brigadier general in the American Expeditionary Forces, directing Allied military procurement in France. Following the war, European economic collapse and catastrophic German hyperinflation culminated in the military occupation of Germany's industrial Ruhr valley by French and Belgian troops in 1923, threatening an immediate renewal of general European war.

In 1924, the Allied Reparations Commission appointed Dawes to chair an international committee of financial experts. In April 1924, Dawes presented the 'Dawes Plan': it restructured German war reparations into manageable annual payments tied to economic recovery, provided an immediate $200 million American loan (the Dawes Loan) to stabilize the German mark, and secured the full withdrawal of French troops from the Ruhr. The plan restored European financial equilibrium and paved the way for the Locarno Treaties. Elected Vice President alongside Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Dawes received the 1925 Nobel Peace Prize, donating his entire prize money to the Walter Hines Page School of International Relations.