David Joel Swykert

David’s spirit entered “The Mystic” on July 20, 2022. Born and raised in Detroit, David had a long career in Michigan truck dispatch and logistics; capped by a final 10 years as a 911 operator with Michigan Tech Department of Public Safety, once he moved to Keweenaw County, MI.

He is survived by, and remembered lovingly by, his partner, Donna Vitucci; his children Dawn Swykert Johnson, David Joel Swykert, Jr. and partner Melanie, Robert Thomas Swykert and wife Becky; 8 grandchildren;8 great-grandchildren; brother Roger Swykert and wife Rodie; brother Joe Swykert and wife Debby; a niece, several nephews, cousins, and second cousins; a cadre of friends. David was a writer of published crime novels, as well as a trio of short books about Maggie Harrington, inspired by a Keweenaw resident during the peninsula’s copper mining heyday. He felt Maggie’s story was his best work. He had a reverence for life, and all living things. He came to prefer vegetables over meat, and often, he said, animals over (most) people. David fiercely loved his family and Michigan’s Keweenaw; the two were bedrock in his heart. He and his gentle spirit are missed more than words can say.